


Demon Detective

by CousinSerena



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Action & Romance, Demon Summoning, Eventual Romance, Haunted Houses, Hurt Aziraphale (Good Omens), Hurt Crowley (Good Omens), Hurt/Comfort, Idiots in Love, Ineffable Idiots (Good Omens), Jealous Aziraphale (Good Omens), M/M, Mystery, Slow Burn, Summoning Circles, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-12
Updated: 2020-01-22
Packaged: 2020-12-09 14:05:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 37,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20996036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CousinSerena/pseuds/CousinSerena
Summary: The Apocalypse has been averted--but after being relieved of duty by the head office, what’s a demon to do?  Aziraphale stays busy with his bookshop, so Crowley decides to open his own business, a detective agency, right down the street.  After all, detectives are cool and there might be car chases.  His first case involves a mysterious blonde, a haunted house, and a reluctant angel who gets roped into the affair.  Hopefully they can solve the case before one of them is killed—or inconveniently discorporated.Whump and more romance in future chapters.





	1. A New Venture

**Author's Note:**

> Is the premise a bit goofy? Maybe. But I kept thinking of book-Crowley putting those bullet hole decals on the Bentley just to look cool. I think he probably loved movies like the Maltese Falcon back in the '40s.  
This started out as a buddy detective romp, but took a darker turn as I wrote--not TOO dark, though!  
In the beginning of this story, they’re just starting out in their new relationship, getting closer but not quite admitting they’re a romantic couple yet. This will change during the course of the story.  
I don’t have a beta reader, so let’s hope this works out.  
Also, do leave a kudo or comment if you like!

It was a slow morning at the bookshop. The customers included an old man poking around the history section, and an American tourist couple browsing the fiction section. Aziraphale was just thinking about lunch when the phone rang. He answered on the first ring, certain he knew the identity of the caller. “Hello, dear boy.”

“Aziraphale, what if I’d been some nice little grandma calling about a dusty old first edition of Little Women? What would she think of you calling her ‘dear boy?’”

“First, a nice little grandma probably wouldn’t be able to afford said volume; and second, I always know when it’s you. Oh, and third, my books are _not_ dusty. Are we still on for lunch? I was expecting to see you pull up in the Bentley by now.”

“We’re still on, angel, but come meet me instead. I’m at a fascinating new establishment I’d like you to see. It’s not far. The address is—”

Aziraphale scrambled to find a stub of pencil to write it down.

He frowned. “Wait, but that’s only just down the street. I don’t remember a new restaurant opening that close.”

“I didn’t say it’s a restaurant, did I?”

“What—well then why….” Aziraphale sputtered.

He could hear Crowley’s exasperated sigh on the other end. “Just meet me, angel. Ciao.” And he’d hung up.

Aziraphale sighed and rolled his eyes, but he flipped the sign on the front door and closed the shop for lunch. What had Crowley gotten up to now? He grabbed his umbrella, noting the grey clouds gathering, and he left the shop walking briskly down the street. After only a minute he neared the address Crowley had given him, and realized it was merely the office building the next block down. Like the other buildings on the street, including the bookshop, the building had a lovely Victorian feel to it. It was all dark wood and brass. There was a panel framed in brass near the front door which listed business names next to office numbers. There was a Dr. Payne (dentist), an Ackerman (attorney) and then—_Oh Good Lord_, thought Aziraphale. 

There it was, third name down. Aziraphale stared at it a moment longer than necessary, out of sheer incredulity. It read, “A.J. Crowley, Private Detective.” He was in Number 205. Private Detective? Since when? What was the ridiculous demon playing at now?

He took the stairs as fast as he could. The office in question was the second on the right. He was just catching his breath and raising his hand to knock when he heard Crowley call out, “Come on in, angel. Door’s unlocked.”

He entered the office, and it felt as though he’d stepped into some noir detective film. It was a small yet tidy room, with a filing cabinet (empty), a bookshelf with some volumes of leather bound books, and a large ficus plant in one corner. A huge mahogany desk sat in the middle of the room, and Crowley sat behind it, leaning back in his chair, feet planted on the desk, hands clasped behind his head. He was dressed in a 1940’s era suit, complete with hat, wearing a self-satisfied grin. 

“Good Lord,” Aziraphale said, this time aloud. “Crowley, what on Earth is this all about?”

“Pull up a chair, Aziraphale.” He gestured to the plush leather chair in front of his desk.

Aziraphale settled into the chair, and his blue eyes drifted once again to the bookshelf. His eyes narrowed.

“Crowley?”

“Yes, angel?”

“Those books on your shelf. They look awfully familiar. You didn’t by chance actually _steal_ volumes from my shop to decorate your new office, did you?” 

“Did you know your eyes actually change color a bit when you’re angry? They go from sky blue to a sort of steely grey blue.”

“The _books_, Crowley!”

“Well—oh, come on, angel. I just borrowed a few books I thought would help me out and look classy in my office at the same time. “Didn’t really _steal _them. Course even if I had, I _am_ still a demon you know.”

“Yes, I’m often reminded of that fact.” He sighed. “I suppose I can’t be angry with you. That’s the problem, I can _never_ manage to stay angry at you. Even when you deserve it. At least it looks like you picked sensible titles, some detective fiction and reference books. Though I’m not sure why you felt the need to take the Hieronymus Bosch volume.”

“No reason at all. I just like the pictures. So what do you think, angel—really?” Crowley sat straight in his chair and swept his arm to gesture at the room.

“The office is charming. But Crowley, why on Earth would you open a detective business? I didn’t even know you were interested in this line of work. Besides, have you had any actual training or experience in solving mysteries? Other than finding the real Antichrist after we’d botched things up in the first place.”

“That still counts, you know. How hard can it be, angel? And let’s face it—most people who want to hire me are just going to have me tail a cheating spouse and take some pictures. It’s not like on the telly, where I’ll have to be as brilliant as Columbo or Jessica Fletcher.”

“Who?”

“Honestly, angel, have you really never watched television?”

“Well, I’ve seen televisions in shops, of course—”

“Oh, for Hell’s—all right, a _book_ detective then—Sherlock Holmes. I don’t have to be as clever as him. The point is, angel, I doubt I’ll get many real clients and the ones I do get won’t be bringing me anything more than cheating spouses, lost pets, or maybe occasional employee theft. And I’ve got lots of experience sneaking around, spying on people, prying confessions out of people—you get the idea.” 

He pulled down his sunglasses and gazed over the rims at Aziraphale. “Look, I need to do something during the day when we’re not together, don’t I? Now that I’ve been effectively fired from my day job, it’s not like I’m going to run around just doing temptations day and night for no reason. I just fool around all day and look forward to the evening so I can—you know, hang out with you.”

Aziraphale felt an odd but pleasant little tingle at that. He loved their new habit of spending evenings at the shop, talking over a bottle of wine. “I feel the same way, dear,” he said softly. “I always look forward to our evenings.”

“Yeah?” Crowley was still mildly surprised when the angel said things like that. He was not really deserving of an angel’s affection. He might not be on active duty with Hell, but he was still a demon after all—and dammit, was he _blushing_? He cleared his throat uncomfortably.

“Well, in any case, you have your bookshop, and now I’ll have a business of my own too.” 

He looked so proud and pleased with himself, Aziraphale didn’t have the heart to poke fun at his new venture. Who knew? Perhaps he’d get a little business and occupy his time, and it would keep him out of trouble, relatively speaking.

“I think it’s a brilliant idea, Crowley,” he said, mustering up an enthused smile.

“You do? Really?”

“Yes, dear boy—I mean, _Detective_. Now If you don’t mind, I am quite famished.”

They sauntered over to the new fish and chip shop that had opened two blocks away. The sky was just beginning to clear a bit, the threat of rain dissipating. The whole time, Crowley recounted to Aziraphale the many detective movies and TV shows he’d watched to prepare for his new venture. He’d watched how to elude someone in a car chase, how to pick locks, and how to show up at a crime scene to search for clues and annoy the local police.

“That’s all very exciting, my dear,” commented Aziraphale supportively as he polished off the last of the chips. “I just hope you won’t be too disappointed if your first case is a little old lady who’s missing her cat.”

“Oh, it won’t bother me, angel. Like I said it’ll give me something to do while you’re pottering around with your dusty books.”

“I do not ‘potter,’” said Aziraphale. “And I’ll have you know none of my books are dusty. I keep them as pristine as my—”

“Don’t say your wings, angel. I’ve seen them. You haven’t properly groomed them in over a century,” Crowley said, pointing a chip at the angel for emphasis. He was rewarded with Aziraphale’s pursed-lip schoolmarm look of disapproval, which Crowley absolutely loved to provoke him into making. 

“My wings are fine,” he retorted. “Wasn’t going to say wings anyhow,” he added, muttering under his breath.

They paid for their lunch and sauntered slowly back to Crowley’s office, Aziraphale promising to find some other detective and other reference books to fill out Crowley’s bookshelves a bit. Aziraphale decided to go up with Crowley and visit a little more, since it had been so slow at his own shop. Besides, he’d left his umbrella there.

When they arrived back at Crowley’s office, they stopped short in the hallway just outside. The door was ever so slightly ajar. “I know I locked it,” said Crowley, puzzled. “At least I’m pretty sure I did. Angel?”

“I’m afraid I wasn’t paying attention. I was still in shock over the fact that you have an office.”

This time Crowley made an annoyed face. “Thanksss,” he hissed. “I must have only _thought_ it latched. Well, I might as well open the door since we’ve made enough noise. Whoever’s inside knows we’re out here now, don’t they?”

He pushed the door open to see a woman seated in the same chair Aziraphale had occupied just an hour ago. She turned her head, smiling at the two of them, and rose. She was model gorgeous, with silky long blonde hair cascading in waves around her shoulders. She wore slim fitting black pants and a very form fitting red sweater which showed off her curvy figure. She glided over, hips swaying, to Crowley. Her smile grew wider as her full red lips parted to reveal perfect white teeth. 

Aziraphale took an uncharacteristically instant dislike to her.

“Are you Anthony J. Crowley?” she asked. Crowley nodded, speechless.

“So pleased to meet you,” said the woman, her smile faltering a bit. She looked troubled. “I’m Rebecca Blackthorne. I’m in rather serious trouble, and I hope you can help.” She reached her hand out. Aziraphale’s mouth hung open as he watched Crowley _actually kissing her hand_. 

“You see, Mr. Crowley,” she glanced nervously between the two of them. “Please don’t laugh. I know this sounds absurd, but I think—I’m being haunted.”

Crowley put his arm around her and guided her back to the chair. “There now, Ms. Blackthorne. Never fear. Just tell me all about it.” Aziraphale fought not to roll his eyes.

“Oh, thank you,” she breathed, her hand touching Crowley’s shoulder. “You’re so kind.”

Where was a little old lady with a missing cat when you needed one?


	2. A Headache for Aziraphale

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the sultry blonde client pleads for help, and an angel and a demon are invited to a haunted house.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my first multi-chapter fic, and I'll try to post as often as I can! Work gets in the way of writing during the week, but I'll try to get the next chapter up there in a few days.

Ms. Blackthorne turned to Aziraphale and politely shook his hand.   
“I’m Mr. Fell,” he said, with a small, polite smile. “Pleased to meet you.”

“Pleasure,” she said. “You must own the antiquarian bookshop up the street. A.Z. Fell? I’ve only window shopped there, I’m afraid. You have some remarkable first editions in your window.”

“Why yes, my dear. Thank you, that is indeed my establishment,” he said, pleased at the acknowledgment. Perhaps she wasn’t so bad after all. A woman of books, apparently.

As Crowley and Ms. Blackthorne took their seats, Aziraphale became painfully aware that the only two chairs in the office were occupied. Perhaps he should leave Crowley to his new client.

“Ah, Crowley, shall I be going then?”

Crowley looked panicked. “Why not stay, ang—er, I mean—that is, you should stay. Definitely. If it’s all right with you, Ms. Blackthorne, I thought Mr. Fell here could listen in. Just pull up the other chair, why don’t you?”

“What other—oh, I see.” A small chair had miraculously appeared next to Crowley’s behind the absurdly large desk, so that no one would know it hadn’t been there the whole time.

Aziraphale nodded and took a seat.

“Mr. Fell here often assists me on a case,” Crowley said, emphasizing the word ‘assist’ just to annoy the angel. “Bookish people are very good at research.” Crowley grabbed a pencil and pad from the top drawer of his desk and handed it to Aziraphale so he could take notes. The angel took them, throwing a withering glance at Crowley. The demon was going to owe him dinner for this.

“Now,” Crowley continued, “You were saying something about a haunting, Ms. Blackthorne. That’s quite remarkable. Would you elaborate?”

“Call me Rebecca, please.”

“Rebecca, then. That’s a lovely name,” said Crowley, smiling. Aziraphale gripped his pencil so tight he nearly snapped it in two.

“Thank you. You see, I’ve recently inherited my uncle’s estate. I received word just a few weeks ago that my Uncle Silas had passed away. His solicitor contacted me. I was shocked to learn that I’m his only remaining blood relative and rightful heir to his estate. He was my father’s older brother, and he had no children of his own. I’d only met him once, really, as a child. My parents were still alive then, and we went to visit him at his house—Blackthorne Manor. I suppose you could call it our ancestral home. I remember it being a spooky place even then, but it was fascinating to explore during the day. Anyway, my father and Uncle Silas had some kind of terrible argument and so we left, and I hadn’t seen or heard from my uncle since. When I met with the solicitor, I found out there isn’t much money left in the estate to speak of—perhaps £15,000 or so—but there is Blackthorne Manor.”

Crowley raised his eyebrows. “A mansion and 15,000 quid. Nice windfall, that, from an uncle you didn’t really know.”

“Ah, and what is the name of the solicitor, my dear?” interjected Aziraphale.

“Nigel Dixon. He’s with Dixon, Harris and Smythe Solicitors. I’m afraid you’ll have to look up the number. I don’t have it with me.”

“Not a problem,” said Crowley. “Please continue.”

“Well, Blackthorne Manor is situated in Kent County, about an hour away. I live here in London and I work at that fancy new hotel, the one that’s all glass and chrome. My job pays all right, but when I found out I’d inherited the Manor, I was overjoyed. My dream is to fix it up and open it as a Bed and Breakfast. Since I work in the hotel industry, I have experience. I know I could do it. With a small business loan, and with the little I inherited, I’m sure I can turn it into a wonderful B&B.”

“Charming,” said Crowley. “But it’s—ah, _haunted_, is that it?” Crowley was getting impatient to cut to the chase.

“Yes, I promise I will get to that. But a very strange thing happened before I even got to the house. I took a few days off work and packed a few things, planning to go stay at the manor a short time to size up the situation—you know, see what repairs and renovations would have to be made. Well, the very day before I left, I got my mail and there was an envelope with no return address. I thought it was junk, but something made me open it. Inside the envelope there was just a bit of paper with big block letters that read, _Stay away from Blackthorne Manor_.” Rebecca opened her purse and drew an envelope from it, handing it to Crowley. “I was frightened of course, but I couldn’t let an anonymous note from some crackpot keep me away from my inheritance.”

“Very brave of you. Can I keep this?” asked Crowley.

“Of course,” she said. “Anyway, I left for Blackthorne Manor the very next morning. I was greeted by the caretaker, Mrs. Monaghan. She lives in a small cottage on the grounds with her husband, the groundskeeper. She helped me get my things settled and I spent most of the day exploring the home. It’s as strange and spooky as I remembered it.” She hugged herself. “It’s a cold and dark place, and so many empty rooms. Most of them are just closed off and any furniture was simply covered in plastic sheeting. Twice a month Mrs. Monaghan would have a small cleaning crew come and give everything a good vacuum and dusting, and scrub the rooms my uncle actually lived in.”

“What’s this Mrs. Monaghan like? Can you tell us a bit about her?” asked Crowley. Aziraphale noted irritably that Crowley was sitting back in his chair with his hands folded while _he_ was scribbling away furiously, taking all the notes.

“Certainly. She’s an older woman of course. She and Mr. Monaghan were caretakers there even when I’d visited as a child. Honestly, she hasn’t changed much—still a bit stern, hair up in a bun all the time. She did have the oddest conversation with me shortly after I arrived, though. I’d asked her about Uncle Silas’ wife Lydia. My aunt died young, long before my family and I visited the home. Nobody ever spoke of her, and if anyone mentioned her name the subject was always changed immediately. I asked her the question I’d always wondered about—how did she die? Mrs. Monaghan just pursed her lips for a moment and then gave me a look of—well, I would say fury, but perhaps I read more into it than I should.

Then she said, ‘There are things we do not discuss in this house. That episode in Mr. Blackthorne’s life was mercifully short-lived. The goings-on in this house when she was alive—it would chill your bones, girl. Thankfully, even for witches, dead is dead.’ And then she bustled back into the kitchen. I knew better than to pursue it. My aunt and uncle must have had a bad relationship. Maybe Lydia was mentally disturbed. I don’t know what to make of the witch comment, and I’m not sure I want to know. Frankly, it’s hard to picture my uncle ever having been young and in love and married.

At any rate, I went to bed early that night. I was tired and I’d made a huge list of things I’d have to address before I could turn the house into a B&B. There are lots of little repairs besides paint, fresh décor, and I’d have to discuss the grounds with Mr. Monaghan. I didn’t want to insult him but clearly the job of upkeep has been too much for just himself.

Mrs. Monaghan had prepared one of the bedrooms down the hall from my uncle’s room. She’d made it as welcoming as possible, and it would be charming with some fresh paint and wallpaper. She’d put clean sheets and bedding on the four poster bed, and I was so tired I fell asleep very quickly.” Aziraphale scribbled away, and Ms. Blackthorne had paused as if to gather herself before continuing.

“I’d been asleep for a few hours—the clock read 1:15 in the morning—when I bolted awake. I wasn’t sure what had awakened me. And then I heard it. A noise, like a woman crying, utterly brokenhearted. I can’t describe it more except to say it sounded distant and yet close at the same time. I know that doesn’t make sense, but it was otherworldly. It sounded like a younger woman’s voice but I couldn’t be sure. At last, after listening to this for I don’t know how long, I worked up all my courage to go to the bedroom door and crack it open. I thought maybe Mrs. Monaghan had come back into the house for some reason and something had happened. I called out her name, and then the sobbing abruptly stopped, and it was silent again.

I went back into my room and locked the door. For the longest time I just stayed awake in bed, afraid and yet trying to read a silly romance novel to get my mind off that awful crying. I must have nodded off, because the next thing I knew I heard footsteps outside in the hall, stopping on the other side of my door. They were heavy footsteps, and uneven. It sounded like someone walking with a limp, dragging one foot along. I can’t tell you how terrified I was, Mr. Crowley. I sat there frozen, praying whoever or whatever it was would go away. And then—” she put her hand on her chest and took a deep breath as if to calm herself. “Then, the doorknob turned back and forth. Thank God I had locked it. Well, something snapped me out of my fear and I got angry instead. I flipped my light on and went for the door. I flung it open to yell at whoever was trying to scare me but—I’m sure you’ve guessed—there was nobody there at all.” She wrung her hands together. They were visibly trembling.

Crowley cleared his throat. “Well, it looks to me like whoever sent you the rude note is the one trying to scare you away from the house. But who and why?”

“But how could someone be outside my door one second and vanish the next? And I’m telling you, Mr. Crowley, those sobbing noises were unearthly. You may think I’m a fool, but I think the house may really be haunted. Perhaps by my Aunt Lydia’s spirit.”

Crowley and Aziraphale glanced at each other. Ghosts were a thing, of course. There were those poor souls who hadn’t found their way to Heaven—or Hell—and became trapped in an earthly plane. Still, it wasn’t as common as television ghost hunters would have one think.

“I take it you’d like us to investigate the note and spend some time in the house?” asked Crowley. 

Rebecca stood. “Oh, Mr. Crowley, I’d be so grateful if you would. If you spend a night in that house, you’ll see what I’m telling you is true. You and Mr. Fell, of course,” she added.

Crowley assured her they would do their best to track down the writer of the mysterious note, and they would arrange to spend a night or two at the manor if she would notify the caretakers that they would be coming. They agreed that the upcoming weekend would be best. She rose to leave after giving them her contact information.

Crowley reached his right hand out to shake Rebecca’s hand. “We’ll be in touch very soon, Rebecca.”

She clasped both hands around Crowley’s. “Thank you so much, Mr. Crowley. I don’t know what I’d do without your help.” Her hands lingered just a bit too long on his, and she drew them away slowly, almost caressingly. “Oh, and you too of course, Mr. Fell,” she said as she left the office.

She glided out into the hall and Crowley closed the door behind her. “Well, that was something.”

“‘You too, Mr. Fell,’ indeed,” huffed Aziraphale. “Listen, Crowley, you do realize I have my own business to tend to? I can’t spend every afternoon scribbling notes for your clients. I believe I have writer’s cramp,” he said, giving his hand a shake. “You really do need a computer. And now you expect me to just close shop and run off with you to a haunted house this weekend? Honestly!”

“Oh, come on Aziraphale. We have to help her. You’re an angel, this is the sort of thing you do—helping ladies in distress. Besides, this is _fun_. And anyway, I’ll pay you for your trouble.”

Aziraphale turned to him with a sudden realization.

“Pay? You know, you actually didn’t say anything to Ms. Blackthorne about your fee, Crowley.”

“Wha—oh, yeah. Well, whatever she pays is fine, angel.”

“Crowley! You can’t run a business like that. You have rent, operating expenses…”

Crowley stared at him blankly.

Aziraphale pinched the bridge of his nose. Angels normally didn’t get headaches, yet he felt a mild tension headache coming on.

“Crowley?”

“What—why should I be paying rent, angel? Not like anyone’s _using_ the place or anything.”

“My dear, you can’t just move in and _use_ a place. People will notice! The landlord will be expecting rent. And I’m certain you don’t have a licence to be operating a business.”

“Ah, well, that’s all easily fixed,” he said, waving his hand with a flourish. “Like magic,” he grinned.

“I give up,” Aziraphale sighed. “Look, we can discuss all this tomorrow over breakfast assuming I haven’t taken to my bed with an actual migraine by then.”

“Angels don’t get migraines.”

“Well this may be a first,” snapped Aziraphale. He was irritated at being roped into babysitting Crowley in his new business, if you could even call it that. He was playing detective, but now a human was involved, and she was depending on him for help. Aziraphale would have to make sure Crowley acted sensibly through the whole thing and didn’t get everyone into further trouble. He was also unaccountably annoyed at the client herself. Did young women today always throw themselves on men like that? Swaying her hips and petting his hand.

“Angel,” said Crowley, taking his glasses off and giving him his best puppy dog/snake eyes, “I really do appreciate your help, you know.”

Aziraphale’s shoulders slumped in defeat. “Yes, all right, Crowley. But I’m very tired and I’m going to go home to my nice little room above the shop and get some sleep. I don’t normally sleep, but for once, I need it. I just hope you know what you’ve gotten us into.”

And with that, he left to go home. Crowley scowled and pouted. “‘… _hope you know what you’ve gotten us into_,’” he mocked.

He turned and glared at the ficus tree in the corner. “What are _you_ looking at?”

Aziraphale was glad to return to his nice, predictable bookshop. It was early evening by now, so he left the Closed sign on the door. He put the kettle on for a badly needed cup of tea. It had been an interesting but long afternoon, and the whole thing had unsettled him. He didn’t know what to make of Crowley’s new venture, and something didn’t sit right with him regarding that blonde client of his. She practically draped herself all over Crowley. Besides, he couldn’t believe he’d gotten himself _involved_ in the whole thing. Why couldn’t Crowley just have taken up a nice hobby instead of opening a detective business? Painting, perhaps, or stamp collecting—or even an outdoor activity. Golf? He pictured Crowley in a white and plaid golf outfit with a little hat, lining up his put, and broke into a giggle. Apparently he was so tired he was getting hysterical. Honestly, he would never have guessed that morning that his day would turn patently ridiculous with a demon detective, a mysterious woman in danger and an invitation to a haunted house.

He decided to do something productive while he waited for the kettle to boil, and walked over to his reference section, perusing for something for his friend’s bookshelves. Aziraphale felt a pang of guilt. After all, this was Crowley’s first business venture and he was so excited about it. He shouldn’t have scolded him. Still, Crowley really should learn something about operating a business. He reached for “The Essentials of Entrepreneurship,” by Josiah E. Whitmore, and began perusing it. Perhaps it was too dated to be useful. Much had undoubtedly changed since 1925, after all. 

He was just reaching to put it back on the shelf when he heard a faint scraping sound behind him, like a shoe scraping on the wood floor. Aziraphale froze. 

He was alone in the shop, or so he’d thought. Perhaps a mouse? Or…

“Crowley?”

But the only answer was the sound of glass breaking against the back of Aziraphale’s head. There was a flash of blinding pain, and then everything went black.


	3. Tea Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some TLC for our angel, and a clue pointing to something diabolical at work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, folks, I know my chapters are kind of short. This one was supposed to be part of a longer chapter, but I felt there was just a natural break at the end.   
Also, I'm going to be adding more tags as I’ve outlined the rest of the story. Action and spookiness ahead...
> 
> And, thanks for the wonderful comments--they keep me writing!!

Aziraphale swam slowly back to consciousness, aware of three things. First, his head was throbbing in utter agony; second, he couldn’t seem to open his eyes; and third, someone was annoyingly slapping at his face and saying his name repeatedly.

“Aziraphale? Aziraphale? Come on, angel. Wake up, you have to wake up. Open your eyes. Tell me I’m an annoying idiot. A foul fiend. _Anything_.”

Aziraphale’s eyes fluttered and opened just a bit. He heard someone groaning loudly, and it took him a moment to realize that it was him. He tried to focus on the pair of yellow eyes that were gazing down on him. Either those eyes were filled with tears or his vision was blurry. It certainly was hard to keep his eyes open.

“Crowley?” he said, but it came out a faint whisper.

He was lying on a sofa, a soft pillow under his head and a tartan blanket tucked over him. Crowley knelt next to the sofa, staring down at the pale angel.

“Thank Go—Thank Someone,” said Crowley. “Angel, I’m so sorry. This is all my fault, I should never have dragged you into this business. I’m so stupid. I don’t know if you can forgive me but if you do, I don’t deserve it.” His face scrunched as he fought to suppress a sob, lost the fight, then buried his face in his hands and cried with relief and regret. 

He’d been upset when Aziraphale had left his office in a huff, then realized perhaps he should go make amends and offer to buy him dinner. When he approached the office, the sign still read CLOSED but the door was unlocked. He’d found Aziraphale lying on the floor, a glass vase shattered all around, and blood seeping into his wavy blond hair. He was lying so still and pale, he’d thought the worst. They may be supernatural beings, but their bodies were human. And now that Heaven had effectively washed their hands of the angel, as Hell had done with Crowley, discorporation would be more than a mere inconvenience.

Nothing like this had ever happened to the angel, not in his own shop. Someone had broken in or followed him, and Crowley could sense the malicious vibrations in the air. He knew it was connected to the case of the Blackthorne woman and her haunted house. If he’d known what would happen to Aziraphale, he never would have involved him.

“Angel, I thought you were—I was so scared.” He looked into Aziraphale’s eyes. He’d heard with head injuries, you had to check to see if the pupils were normal. He lifted his lids gently, as the angel was still having trouble keeping them open. He’d heard you also have to keep the patient awake if you could.

“Angel, you _have_ to try to stay awake,” he said earnestly. “You’re going to have to heal yourself, I can’t do it for you. This isn’t like my blowing a paint spot off your jacket. If my demonic energy enters your bloodstream, it’ll just injure you more. Come on, angel. _Please_. Open your eyes.”

Aziraphale heard him and tried to keep his eyes open. His lids were so heavy. The pain was crushing, and he felt sick to his stomach. “Hurts,” he managed to croak.

Crowley smoothed his hair back gently. “I know. I know it does, angel. But I’m going to lift your hand up for you. I’m going to put your hand on your head, and you have to try to channel a bit of Energy through your fingers, okay? Just a little to help the pain. If you can’t do this, I’m going to call an ambulance and the humans can heal you.” Perhaps he should have called for an ambulance straight away. But he and Aziraphale both shared a distrust and mild fear of human hospitals, with their strange smells, bright fluorescent lights and aura of pain and fear.

Crowley gently lifted Aziraphale’s right arm up and put his hand on his temple. His hand was so cold—_please let it not be too late_, he thought. The motion nearly made Aziraphale vomit, but he tried to find his Power through the nausea and the pain. If he could focus, just a little….

A faint glow travelled from Aziraphale’s hand, through his fingers to his temple. Crowley could see the light enter, and Aziraphale’s eyes opened wider and slowly grew clearer. Finally, some color returned to his cheeks and he took a deep breath. Crowley let out a deep breath himself, unaware he’d been holding it.

“Crowley,” managed the angel. “It’s okay. Thank you for finding me. I’m so sorry, my dear. I was mean to you.”

The demon made a noise between a laugh and a sob. “_You’re_ sorry? Angel, what could you possibly be sorry about? I dragged you into this mess. And all for such a stupid reason—what was I thinking, playing around being a detective? It’s not like I even really _care_ about helping anyone, I just thought it would be fun to sneak around, maybe have a car chase or two, you know, like in the movies. I should’ve just set myself up as a mercenary or con man for hire. S’all I’m good for.” He was too ashamed to meet the angel’s eyes.

Aziraphale reached down and put his hand on Crowley’s shoulder. “My dear fellow,” he said, “You decided to have a detective business because you _do_ like helping people—yes, I know, you love car chases too,” he smiled wanly. “But I’ve seen how tender your heart is, I saw it all the way back at the beginning of the Flood. _My_ side didn’t worry about the drowning children. But you did. You may not be the best demon, Crowley, but you’re the best person I know.”

Crowley’s eyes were annoyingly watery again. “Do you mean it, angel? Really? Even though I’m continually causing mischief and mayhem in your life?”

“I mean it, my dear. And my life would be deadly dull without you.” He winced in pain.

“Angel, your head.”

“Ah, yes. I’d better make another pass.” He knew that he had a concussion. He’d read about the symptoms in his medical volumes. He focused his Power, a bit stronger now, healing the injured tissue and nerves from the inside out. His headache finally cleared, the nausea dissipated, and lastly, he healed the cut on his head and miracled the dried blood away. He sat up slowly and carefully.

“Much better,” he said. “In fact, I think I’ll finish getting that tea now.”

“You rest, I’ll make the bloody tea. Healing is hard work.” And then on an impulse, Crowley grabbed the sides of the angel’s head—_his_ angel’s head—and planted a kiss on top of his blond curls. A small, crazy part of him wanted to go for his mouth instead, but he didn’t want to scare Aziraphale by being forward (_You go too fast, Crowley_.) Crowley headed for the stove, so he didn’t see the little smile or the blush blooming on the angel’s cheeks.

Crowley brought the tea and some biscuits over so Aziraphale could stay put. One thing was for certain, Crowley was going to find out who had nearly killed his angel, and they were going to pay dearly. He seethed, imagining dipping whoever it was in a pool of boiling sulphur.

But, he wasn’t going to resume discussing the case until Aziraphale felt better. And for the angel, that required baked goods and strong tea with milk.

It wasn’t until he’d had a bit to eat and drink that Aziraphale’s eyes wandered over to the mess near his reference book section. The shattered remains of a vase were still there, and something else.

“Crowley, what’s that paper lying next to the broken glass?”

Crowley sauntered over and picked it up. “Looks like a book cover,” he said. He turned it right side up and frowned at it. “It’s _Best Cake Recipes from Around the World_. Did someone actually hit you over the head to steal a _cookbook_? Angel? What’s wrong? Are you all right? Do you need to lay down some more?” 

Aziraphale had gone pale again, and the hand holding his raspberry jam biscuit was trembling. “Oh no,” he said. “Oh, dear Lord.” He looked wide-eyed at Crowley. “That was no cookbook, my dear. I’d put that jacket on a very rare and valuable book in order to disguise it. I kept that book in my private office, in fact.”

“Well still, someone went to all that trouble and nearly _killed_ you for a book?” Crowley asked incredulously.

“It was no ordinary book, Crowley. This book was the missing volume of The Lemegeton, otherwise known as the Lesser Key of Solomon. Crowley, it’s a grimoire—a spell book—on demonology. With this volume, a sorcerer can perform spells of the most powerful kind of black magic.”

“A sorcerer, or maybe a _witch,_” said Crowley. “Or the ghost of one.”


	4. Of Books and Bentleys

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our detectives formulate a plan, and Crowley has a bit of fun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was very tired while writing this, so it took me a little while. I promise I'll get these two snooping around that haunted house soon, and a bit more romance in the next chapter I think!

For the first time in centuries Aziraphale needed to sleep that night, so Crowley uncharacteristically did _not_ sleep. He knew the angel must be exhausted from the injury and the healing, but he wasn’t about to go back to his own flat and leave him alone. He still had nightmares about the burning bookshop, and now he’d nearly lost the angel a second time. He made Aziraphale get into his tartan pajamas, tucked him into bed in his little flat above the shop, and announced he was keeping watch that night. 

“Really, Crowley, you’re behaving like a mother hen.” Aziraphale tried to sound exasperated but his heart did a funny little swoop as Crowley fluffed his pillow and made sure his feet were tucked under the blanket. 

“I am not,” snapped Crowley. “But you need to get some sleep, and I’m going to stand guard. I’m putting up some better wards around this place, and then I’ll stay up and watch some TV.”

“But I don’t have a television, Crowley.”

The demon snapped his fingers.

“You do now. Good night, angel,” he said, closing the door but leaving a small crack just in case—in case of what? He was going to make sure nothing got past him. However, leaving the door open a crack made it easier for Crowley to creep in and check on him during the night without waking him up. Which he did, several times.

In the morning Aziraphale padded downstairs and sat at the little table in his tiny makeshift kitchen area, which was tucked away in the private back room of the shop. He almost felt back to his old self again after a night’s rest. Perhaps he should sleep more often. Crowley was already seated and waiting for him, having set out a pot of tea, toast, and some biscuits he’d found in Aziraphale’s cupboard. 

Aziraphale beamed at him. “Crowley, first you stand guard all night and now _this_.” He gestured at the spread on the table.

“All right, angel, don’t go all gooey on me,” he said gruffly, yet secretly very pleased with himself. “You scared me yesterday is all. Like the time I thought you’d burned yourself up in the shop. Now that you’re better, I expect some help with this evil spell book thing.”

“Of course, my dear, back to business. Quite right,” said Aziraphale, suppressing a smile. He helped himself to a piece of toast and some marmalade. “You know, Crowley,” he said as he dumped sugar into his tea, “Speaking of that dreadful book, it’s entirely possible that the theft is completely unconnected to Ms. Blackthorne’s case.”

“I thought of that too, angel, but it’s too coincidental. There’s a house that’s supposedly being haunted by the spirit of a witch—and not a Wiccan, either. We’re not talking about crystals, herbs and moon spells. This is black magic from the sounds of it. What did that housekeeper tell our client? ‘Goings on that would chill your bones,’ he intoned in his best Karloff impression. “Then,” he continued, “not an hour after Rebecca Blackthorne leaves my office, you get knocked on the head and a book on black magic is stolen. That would be some coincidence.”

“I suppose I see your point,” the angel conceded. “Still….”

“Look, that’s not all,” Crowley continued. “Aziraphale, when I came into the shop and found you lying on the floor, I could still sense the presence of something malevolent lingering in the air. It was fading, but it was still definitely there.”

“Demonic, would you say?”

“No, that’s just it. I can’t even describe it. But it definitely _wasn’t_ demonic, I can sniff out a demon as easy as you can sniff out a new bake shop.”

“I resent that—even if it is true,” said Aziraphale. “Though it’s odd, I didn’t sense anything at all. Just heard something behind me and then—although….” He frowned.

“Although what, angel? Did you remember something?”

“I heard a scraping sound, like a shoe dragging on the floor, and I absolutely froze. I felt like a deer in the headlights, as they say. Some of it was fright, but there are very few things in the world that have made me utterly freeze in terror. Not even Gabriel,” he joked.

“Angel, let me see that book cover again, will you?” said Crowley.

“Oh, well certainly—though it’s actually called a _dust jacket_. Why do you want to see it? As I’d said, it was only to disguise the real book.” The angel glanced around. “Oh, you must have put it somewhere, my dear. After all, I was indisposed.”

“Indisposed,” muttered Crowley. “Nearly discorporated again, you mean. Ah, here it is.” He found it on the sofa across from the angel’s new 75 inch HD television. 

He picked the paper up by the edge. Sure enough he sensed the lingering presence of evil clinging to it. There was an odd sensation like ants crawling over his hand and stinging him. This was something unfamiliar. He handed it to Aziraphale. “See what you make of it.”

Aziraphale took it but he could only hold it a moment before dropping it to the floor. For the angel, it was freezing cold and a faint aura of fear clung to the paper. He felt a dull phantom throb on the back of his head where he’d been hit. The room tilted sickeningly for just a moment. He pressed his hand against his head, steadying himself.

“Angel, you okay?” asked Crowley. Of course he wasn’t okay, he realized. If Crowley, a demon, could sense evil clinging to an object then Aziraphale would be doubly sensitive to it and in a different way.

“I’m fine,” the angel replied, sitting up straight again, and taking his tea cup with a slightly trembling hand. He had grown pale again.

“Dammit, you’re not fine. And it’s not just the book cover—dust jacket,” said Crowley. “That’s the same energy was all around the shop when I came in, but it probably dissipated. Of course, the thing _was_ wrapped around a book of black magic. I’m sorry angel, I shouldn’t have handed it to you. I’m an idiot.”

“Nonsense, Crowley. Think nothing of it, I’m perfectly all right.” As if to prove it, he sat up straighter and took a long draught of tea. “But you know, dear, the odd thing is that the book itself—The Lesser Key of Solomon—certainly didn’t give off evil vibrations when I acquired it,” mused Aziraphale. “Whatever we’re sensing must be left over energy from my intruder. And another thing, Crowley. A ghost didn’t bash me on the head—with a very nice vase that’s now broken, I might add—and steal a book. Whoever or whatever was in my shop was very real and solid.”

“So the ghost isn’t a ghost. Some very naughty book-stealing human is trying to scare Rebecca away from the house. Just like a Scooby Doo episode.”

_“Rebecca” indeed_. _On a first name basis now,_ thought Aziraphale. He frowned. “A scooby what?” he asked.

“Angel, you _do_ have some pop culture homework to do. It’s a good thing I got you that TV.”

“Er, yes, my dear,” he replied, knowing full well who the TV was really for.

Crowley suddenly remembered something. “Angel, did you say you heard a scraping on the floor just before—you know. As if it were dragging a bit on the wood?

“Yes, why?”

“Remember the footsteps Rebecca described outside her own door that night? She said it sounded like one foot dragging on the floor.”

“That’s right, she did. So we have some malevolent person, probably a man, who frightens young women and steals books. And we know there’s some connection with the spell book and trying to scare Ms. Blackthorne out of the house. We also have the unearthly sounds of a ghostly woman crying in the house, and the spell book is filled with black magic and demonology.”

“Nice recap, angel.” Crowley sat thinking for a minute. “Aziraphale, black magic and witchcraft aren’t really my thing, even if I am a fiend from Hell. I’m a bit out of my league here. Maybe it’s time to pay a visit to that mad American witch for some pointers.”

“Miss Device? Crowley, that’s brilliant. She might be able to sense more than we can from the dust jacket and tell us something about the Book of Solomon. I’ll ring her up and we can go at once, if she doesn’t mind.”

_“_Hang on_. We_ are not doing any such thing, angel. You already got yourself smashed on the head, and you don’t need to keep risking life and limb for this. If you want to do some research from the shop, that’s fine—I’ve strengthened the wards all around it, and you can look through your books to see what else you can find. But no going out until we know what we’re dealing with here. I won’t have you getting injured again.” 

“Crowley, I will be fine. I very much want to help you and I’ll be much more useful coming along. Besides, I think I’ve earned my continued involvement in this case.”

“Absolutely not. Getting nearly discorporated was enough. You’re not mucking around in this anymore!” Why did the angel have to be so stubborn?

Crowley wasn’t prepared for Aziraphale’s strong reaction.

“Now see here, Crowley, I am not a child and I certainly don’t need your protection! I _chose_ to be involved. I didn’t have to help you, I _wanted_ to.”

“Angel, I literally threw a pencil at you and _made_ you take notes.”

“Now see here, I realize that as a demon you are very good at tempting—but I do have free will. I could easily have left your office right then, you know. But I stayed because I thought you needed my assistance. And you do.”

“Because you don’t think I can run a business by myself—that’s it, isn’t it? I saw that other book lying on the floor where you dropped it. _Business Advice for Demonic Dummies_, or some such thing. Well, I don’t need your help, angel!”

Aziraphale’s expression changed from hurt to angry all in a moment. “Well, _fine_. If that’s the way you feel, I’ll just clean up the dishes and you can be on your way.” He turned his back as he took the plates to the sink.

“Angel, come on. I didn’t mean…” Crowley hated hurting the angel’s feelings. But he needed to keep him safe.

“You really should run along, Crowley. It’s a long drive,” he said coldly.

“Well, _fine_, then!”

Crowley stalked out of the shop. He stood outside the front door for a minute, pouting and shoulders slumped, and tried to cool off. You would think the angel would have some _gratitude_. He was just trying to protect him, after all. And who needed his help anyway? Stubborn angel. He sulked outside the shop for a minute more and then straightened his shoulders.

He would call Anathema himself on the way there. He headed for the Bentley. But as he reached for the door, he didn’t see the faint golden shimmer that appeared for just a moment inside the car. 

When he got in, the angel was sitting in the passenger seat. He was holding the dust jacket which the demon had completely forgotten to take with him, as well as a brown bag.

Crowley’s jaw tightened. “What the—_dammit,_ angel.”

Aziraphale pursed his lips and raised his eyebrows like a disapproving aunt. “Language, my dear. You forgot the dust jacket. And, I brought along a snack. It’s almost 2 hours to Tadfield,” he said. “More with traffic.”

Crowley sighed. He gave up. The angel was over 6,000 years old, after all. He could make his own decisions. And apparently Crowley _did_ need his help, at least a little. And _possibly_ the angel had a point after all, and he’d be safer sticking with Crowley than alone in his shop. 

“I don’t do traffic,” grinned Crowley. “Buckle up, angel.”

The drive to Tadfield involved a long stretch along the M40, but not before navigating London traffic leaving the city and dealing with driving through a construction zone on the A501. 

Crowley sped along past the endless shops, dodging pedestrians, and barely missing cyclists as they headed toward Park Crescent to the A501. He turned every corner with a screech of tires. Aziraphale clung to the roof handle Crowley had miracled up for him not long ago, after seeing how often the angel braced himself with his hand on the roof. He tried to take deep breaths, as he’d read somewhere that counting breaths could have a calming effect on the nerves. He breathed in for four counts through the nose, out for five counts blowing out his mouth. In for four, out for five. In for four, out for five…

Crowley glanced over to him, frowning. “What on Earth are you doing?”

“It’s controlled breathing, Crowley. It helps me cope with your nerve-shattering driving style.”

“Well, cut it out. You sound like you’re going into labor.”

Aziraphale was just about to retort when he glanced at the side mirror and noted a red car just a couple of cars behind them. He’d first noticed it only a few minutes after they’d left the bookshop. Of course, it was perfectly natural that the car might be taking the same route somewhere, but they’d made a number of turns in seemingly random directions and it had stuck….

“Crowley, there’s a car—”

“Yeah, I noticed it too. Figured I’d see how long it was going to stick behind us. Why did you think I was taking wrong turns all over London? I have to try harder to lose it, angel. We can’t have it following us all the way to Tadfield.”

“It’s a rather flashy looking car, my dear. Er, although I’m confident of course that the Bentley here can outrun anything.” He patted the dash, not wanting to give the Bentley a complex or insult it.

“Just hang on,” said Crowley. He made a sharp right turn across traffic to head down a tiny street running in back of a Japanese noodle shop, Oishii Ramen. The light behind him turned, but the red car had stuck to his tail. Crowley growled. Aziraphale hung on to his seat and the dash, still making a mental note to try the ramen shop if he survived. 

“Oh dear God!” he cried out, realizing that the street had now narrowed to an alleyway barely wide enough for the Bentley, and strewn with pedestrians—mostly young men hanging about smoking—who sequentially leapt back as they barreled down the narrow passage, plastering themselves against the graffiti-covered walls and shop windows. 

“Bicyclist!” the angel screamed, Crowley veering around to miraculously miss the spandex-clad woman.

They careened out of the alleyway onto a busy intersection, heading straight for a cinema. The red car had reappeared, coming at them from the left. It must have detoured around.

Neither Crowley nor Aziraphale could make out who was driving, but Crowley snarled as he recognized the make of the car. “It’s a Bentley GT. So the _modern_ Bentley thinks it can keep up with my classic beauty, does it? Well, we’ll show her, old girl, won’t we?”

Crowley had been veering to head right, across the intersection as the GT came from the left. At the last possible moment, Crowley swung the car round to the left, whizzing in front of and past the red GT by leaping onto the pavement—Aziraphale miracled several bewildered pedestrians off the street, where they found themselves suddenly inside a lingerie shop—then off the pavement, across a lane of traffic and then they were speeding in the opposite direction. 

Crowley had managed a quick glance at the driver, but whoever it was wore a hat and sunglasses. He got the impression of a young man or woman with short black hair just showing under the hat.

At last, they were on the motorway heading east toward Tadfield, the red Bentley GT nowhere in sight. Aziraphale finally unfroze, putting a hand on his still-hammering heart. 

He glanced over at Crowley, who was grinning from ear to ear.


	5. Advice from a Witch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Crowley and Aziraphale decide to consult with Anathema Device on spell books and black magic. She offers advice to Crowley on matters of love, as well as magic. But how will she protect these two idiots as they head off into danger?

Less than an hour later, they sat with Anathema Device in her sunny kitchen. She poured tea for Aziraphale, who honestly looked as though he might need something stronger after the drive. Crowley had dialed her earlier but all he had said on the phone was that they needed advice on a mysterious book of black magic. She wondered what these two had gotten themselves into now. It wasn’t that long ago they had faced down Satan himself and then dodged execution by their respective head offices. Couldn’t they just relax? Take a vacation?

“Thank you, my dear,” said Aziraphale, taking a long sip of tea and sighing. “And, if I may be so bold as to ask, is that an engagement ring?” A beautiful opal and diamond ring sparkled on her left ring finger. 

“It is,” she said, beaming with pride. “Newton and I haven’t set a date yet, but of course the two of you will be invited to the wedding.” She’d have to have them over with Newton more often. They still made him quite nervous, especially Crowley when he removed his sunglasses. 

“If we live that long,” said Crowley dramatically. He sat slouched in his chair, sunglasses off and resting on the table with a cup of black coffee. Like most Americans, Anathema preferred coffee but always had the teapot ready for her guests. Crowley found that he actually preferred coffee himself—it was bolder and had more of a kick. 

They quickly caught Anathema up on the recent events, from the entrance of the sultry Miss Blackthorne to the car chase.

She took a sip of her coffee and looked pointedly at Crowley. “Why a detective agency? You’re a demon whose new job is to help people in need. And why see this whole mess through, anyway? Do you really care about this case? I would think after a bash on the head, a book theft and a car chase you’d just call it a day.”

Crowley shrugged. “A guy needs something to do now that the end of the world’s been called off. Plus I have a new motive, and that’s to pay back whoever broke in and nearly discorporated Aziraphale.”

Aziraphale looked at Crowley fondly, then answered. “You know, Miss Device, Crowley is tricky. Only a demon would think of setting up a false front like a detective agency, purportedly to help people, yet ends up spreading discord through no fault of his own. Proving the errant husband has been cheating, for example. Lives ruined, you see. And he gets to have the fun of sneaking about—” He gave her a meaningful glance. She understood. He was trying to make Crowley sound more demonic than he actually was, to spare his ego. 

“And don’t forget the car chases,” Crowley added, grinning. “Got to check that one of my list today, eh, angel?”

Aziraphale pursed his lips disapprovingly. “Indeed. And I hope we don’t repeat the experience.”

“Okay, you two,” said Anathema. “I think I get it. But speaking of car chases, you’re sure nobody followed you the rest of the way here?”

“Oh, no.” said Aziraphale. “I can assure you Crowley lost the tail. Just like a pro.”

Crowley raised his eyebrows at that. “Well, I see you’re learning the vernacular, angel. ‘Lost a tail,’ eh?” Crowley loved hearing the angel trying out modern slang. 

“I do read, my dear,” huffed Aziraphale. “I’ve read many detective novels, I’ll have you know. Even Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett.”

Anathema regarded the angel and demon as they bantered while still casting affectionate glances at each other, rather like an old married couple. She wondered if either of them realized that they were in love. She thought not, since they didn’t even so much as hold hands. 

“You know, speaking of reading, that leads me to my next question,” said Anathema. “You’re a voracious reader, Aziraphale, yet for some reason you never actually read the Lemegeton—the book that was stolen from your shop, did you?” asked Anathema.

Aziraphale flushed a little. “Why, no, I didn’t. But I don’t read each and every volume that comes my way. And there are many books in my collection that are far more appealing than a book of Black Magic. My volumes of Renaissance poetry, for example, or my new first edition Oscar Wilde, or even—”

“Okay, I understand,” said Anathema. But you weren’t curious enough to just flip through it? I mean, it’s an occult book and you guys are occult beings.”

“I’m occult,” drawled Crowley. “Aziraphale here is _celessstial_. Isn’t that right, angel?”

“Quite right,” he said primly. Then he furrowed his brow and set his teacup down with a clank. “Hmmf,” he said. “How odd.”

“What is it?” asked Anathema.

“It’s just—well, you’re right, my dear—about my not reading the book. Just as Agnes Nutter’s Prophecies kept me enraptured for hours, I should have been most eager to have a look at this volume, knowing it contained dark spells and dealt with demonology.” He glanced at Crowley with a little smile and a nod. The demon raised his cup of coffee in acknowledgment. 

“Maybe you weren’t curious because you already have 6,000 years of experience witnessing a first-class demon at work,” said Crowley smugly.

“No. No, it was something else,” Aziraphale insisted, ignoring the small joke. “I’d completely forgotten….” he trailed off, his eyes widening.

“What is it, angel? What’s wrong?” Crowley asked, concern in his voice. 

“You know, I do realize this is hindsight, but the first thing I remember about the spell book was holding it, and as soon as I had it in my hands I only wanted to cover it with a dust jacket and hide it away. I had absolutely no desire at all to look at it. None at all.”

“How did you actually acquire it?” asked Anathema.

“Oh. Well, let me think,” he said. He drummed his fingers on his knees, taking a moment to try to remember. That was odd, he generally had a perfect memory when it came to his prized books and how he acquired them. “I don’t know,” he said helplessly.

“Angel,” said Crowley. “How did you get that first edition Conan Doyle you showed me a couple of weeks ago?”

“Oh, that’s easy. That was from the estate sale of a Mrs. Gordon Halliday. April 13th last year.”

“And the Salvador Dali volume in your folio section?”

“Auction. February 20th, 1978.”

“Your biography of Dickens?”

“Which?”

“I dunno, the old one!”

“Fitzgerald, yes. Acquired from a Mr. Brooks in 1998. September 2nd, to be precise.”

“Okay,” said Crowley. “You see there? I know you, angel. You know every single volume on your shelves and how and where you got it. But you’re telling us that you have _no idea_ where this book of spells came from?”

A look of confusion and dismay came over the angel. Crowley was quite right. This was upsetting—he had a near perfect memory. So why was it failing him now? “I—I just don’t remember,” he stammered.

Crowley reached over the table and put his hand on his shoulder. “It’s okay, angel. Don’t be upset. Look here, witch—I mean, Anathema. Could there be some kind of spell or something on this book? Something that would make a person forget?”

Anathema sighed. Unfortunately she had a pretty good idea what they were dealing with. “I’ve heard of just this kind of thing, but I’ve never encountered it before myself. Of course,” she admitted, “if I had, I guess I wouldn’t remember. That’s the point. It’s called a memory dampening spell,” she said. She put down her coffee and looked at the angel and demon, clasping her hands. 

“This is serious, guys. Someone cursed this book with a memory dampening spell and most likely wanted to get it into Aziraphale’s hands specifically. Whoever it was didn’t want him to remember his—or her—face. And another thing—this someone must be pretty powerful to be able to invoke a spell so strong it could thwart an angel.”

The demon detective and his assistant looked at each other worriedly. It was one thing to play private eye with human clients and criminals, but now they were dealing with true dark magic. 

“Miss Device,” said Aziraphale. “Do you think this is a human witch or wizard, or might we be dealing with supernatural forces?”

She shook her head. “I just can’t say for sure.” She thought for a moment. “Hey, didn’t you say you have the dust jacket that was on the spell book? If I can touch it, I may be able to sense something.”

Crowley produced the paper jacket and handed it to Anathema. Her reaction was instant and dramatic. She touched the paper and felt as though a mild jolt of electricity had shocked her. She forced herself to keep a hold on it, and as she closed her eyes she calmed her breathing and tried to focus on the blurry shape that was forming in the darkness of her mind. She could see a face—blurred as though she were seeing it underwater, but enough that she could tell it was the image of an old man. She tried to focus harder, but the image disappeared, leaving her eyes aching as she opened them. She sighed and shook her head.

“I’m not completely sure, but it feels like a spirit. You guys are right, I’m not sensing anything angelic or demonic. But I’m sensing evil intent. I know that doesn’t help much.”

“Can you tell us about the book itself, Miss Device? I’ve researched a bit about it, but perhaps you know something I couldn’t find.”

“Okay,” she said. “The Lemegeton, which is also known as the Lesser Key of Solomon, is really composed of five works. One of them, the Ars Goetia, is basically a catalog of 72 demons and the seals used to contain each one. Another book contains the summoning spells, and another contains a corresponding list of angels that the summoner can invoke for protection. And before you ask, don’t worry. Your names are not listed in either volume. I’ve seen the lists. However,” she continued in between sips of coffee, “you said your book was a _missing volume_ of the Lemegeton. And that’s what worries me,” she said. “We don’t know if that missing volume includes more seals and sigils—yours, for instance—or if it’s something entirely different. It could even be a volume of necromancy. The question is, why would someone pretend to be haunting your client’s house and then go to all the trouble of stealing this particular book? What’s the connection?”

“I think it’s pretty apparent,” said Crowley. “For some reason whoever’s behind this wants Rebecca out of the house and they’re trying to scare her out first. Maybe this missing book summons actual spirits. Or, it’s a volume of demonic Summoning and they’ll use it to invite a few of my former coworkers over.” 

“Good Lord,” said Aziraphale. “What if they Summon Hastur or Beelzebub?”

“Believe it or not, angel, I can think of worse demons they could Summon.”

“You do realize this could all be a trap of some kind?” asked Anathema.

“She has a point, my dear,” said Aziraphale. “What if you’re the demon someone wants to Summon?”

“That wouldn’t make sense,” said Crowley. “If that’s the case, they’ve had the book for a day already and they could’ve just Summoned me by now. No, if that was it then I’d already be trapped in a seal and being asked for favors.” He shuddered. He knew of other demons who’d suffered the indignity of being Summoned. They invariably came back to suffer jeers and taunts from the other demons when what they really needed was trauma therapy. Other than holy water, few things were as frightening for a demon than to be trapped in a Summoning circle and being forced to comply with some insane human’s demands until released. 

“Look,” said Crowley. “Whatever this is, I want to get to the bottom of it. And, we need to warn Rebecca that this might be more than a haunting. We need to get in that house and find out who or what’s been terrorizing her,” said Crowley, absentmindedly rubbing his hand. Irritated, Aziraphale recalled Ms. Blackthorne caressing that same hand. 

“Yes,” Aziraphale said. “Rebecca.” He said her name as though it were a bad taste in his mouth. “Sorry, yes—of course, we must help Ms. Blackthorne.” Aziraphale rose abruptly. “Would you both excuse me for just a few minutes? I noticed you had some interesting volumes on American history, Miss Device. I’d like to peruse them a bit if you don’t mind.”

“Sure. Though I can’t promise to sell you any for your shop,” she joked.

“My dear, perish the thought!” He strode into her living room and began inspecting her bookshelves.

“What’s gotten into him?” wondered Crowley. He moved his chair closer to Anathema’s so he could speak just above a whisper. She’d noticed him rubbing his hand earlier and wondered about something. She tested her idea. “What’s your client’s name again?” she asked. “Ramona or Rebecca?”

“Rebecca,” he said—and moved his left fingers over to rub at his right hand again. For just a split second his snake eyes dilated and then returned to normal. Anathema wasn’t sure what that was about but made a mental note of it. 

“I don’t know why Aziraphale insists on helping me see this through, especially right after he nearly got discorporated,” said Crowley. “I don’t like the idea of an angel walking into a scary house with a would-be killer after us. And it’s a would-be killer that might be an evil entity of some kind.”

“You’re worried he’s going to get hurt again, or worse,” said Anathema. It wasn’t a question.

Crowley scowled. “Of course, I am. He’s not careful enough—he’s so blessed naïve. Just look at him!”

They glanced over at Aziraphale, who was humming away as he shelved books, tutting over the ones that were in poor condition and happily oohing over interesting titles. 

Anathema regarded Crowley as he gazed at the angel. His mouth was turned up just slightly in a half-smile but his brows were knitted. His expression was one of worry and affection at the same time. Anathema put her hand on his. “It’s clear he means the world to you,” she said.

Crowley turned to her, then looked down at her hand so she wouldn’t see his eyes, which were threatening to tear up. “Yeah, he does,” he said softly. “Literally.”

“Have you told him that?” she asked. 

“’Course I have,” he said gruffly. “Not in just those words, but when the shop burned and I thought—well, I thought the worst, I told him I thought I’d lost my best friend. Though to be honest, I’m not sure he even realized that I was referring to _him_.”

“Crowley, I’m just going to say it. I’ve been watching you guys together this whole time and it’s obvious to me that you two love each other. You should just tell him how you feel.”

He sighed. “Bad idea, witch. Aziraphale’s an angel. He loves me like a best friend, and at least now I have that much. It’s kind of a miracle when you think about who he is and what I am. There was a time he pushed me away, told me we weren’t friends after 6,000 years together and that hurt so much. If I tell him I’m bloody _in love_ with him, it could scare him off and I’ll lose him for good.”

“You are so dense sometimes—” Anathema sighed.

“Now hang on—”

“Crowley, why do you think every time you refer to your blonde sultry client as ‘Rebecca’ he frowns or stomps away like just now? He’s jealous. What did she do, feel you up in your office right in front of him?”

Crowley was stunned. _Jealous?_ Of a client he’d seen only once?

“That’s ridiculous. And no, she didn’t _feel me up_,” he said. “She did get a little handsy. Did a fair amount of batting eyelashes at me and all, I suppose…” 

Could it be true? His heart leapt a little at the idea. Not that he wanted to hurt the—_his_ angel, but if the witch was right and Aziraphale was jealous, then maybe there was hope his feelings were reciprocated.

Before either he or Anathema could discuss it further, Aziraphale joined them again. 

“You do have some fine volumes in your collection, Miss Device. Crowley, should we be getting on back to London? We do need to head out early tomorrow to Blackthorne Manor. And I’m sure you’ll need to contact your client just to touch bases before then.”

“Oh yeah, right, angel. Rebecca’s going to be eager to talk to me again.” He watched the angel’s face carefully. Were the flared nostrils and tight lips his imagination? He didn’t think so. He suppressed a smile. He knew this new development shouldn’t make him happy, but it did.

Anathema walked them out to the Bentley. She insisted upon giving them a precautionary bit of magic, as insurance if anything went wrong. Protection spells were her specialty as a witch. Crowley had a very special relationship with his car, and she tucked a charm bag into the glove compartment—managing to shove it in amongst the endless sunglass supply. She strengthened this further with an incantation for protection. If anything went horribly wrong, the Bentley would be alerted and would know what to do.

As she watched the angel and demon drive away, she couldn’t shake the uneasiness in her stomach. She felt as though she were sending them off into a lion’s den.

“Damn it,” she said aloud. For two supernatural beings, they could be incredibly obtuse. They couldn’t even see what was right in front of them, namely their own love for each other. If they couldn’t recognize basic emotions, how would they even know a trap if they saw it? What else could she do to prevent a disaster? 

And then it hit her. _She_ couldn’t do anything more. But she knew someone who could. She had another trick up her sleeve. 

She picked up the phone and dialed the Young residence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This update took a little longer than usual, so sorry. I swear the spooky stuff is coming, and some heavy romantic angst in the next chapter! Also, I hope this chapter isn't too rambling. Again, kudos and comments are appreciated.


	6. A Small Confession

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Feelings, wine, and finally off to Blackthorne Manor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for taking so long to get this chapter out. It's been a rough month, and stress and work has made it a challenge. I'll try to get the next one out sooner. This chapter has less action, but these two are in for some whump and angst. But don't worry. I only do happy endings!  
Again, no beta reader so I hope there are no glaring errors.  
And, finally, if you like this do leave a comment. I kind of live for them!

It was late afternoon by the time they arrived back in London. They were silent for most of the drive back, each lost in thought over the meeting with Anathema.

As they drove, Crowley kept turning the witch’s observations about Aziraphale over and over in his mind. Did the angel really feel _that way_ about him? Of course they were best friends, he knew Aziraphale enjoyed seeing Crowley nearly every day since they’d faced their respective trials by fire and holy water. But he’d been falling for the angel ever since Eden, when he’d given away his sword to two mortals—and then he’d shielded _him_, a demon of all things, from the rain with his outstretched wing. Aziraphale was at once the most brave, kind, ridiculous, stuffy, pure hearted person he knew. He glanced over at him sitting in the passenger seat of the Bentley, clinging for dear life as he navigated the twists and turns of the road, and wished he could tell him how he felt about him. But if Anathema was wrong, if the angel didn’t reciprocate his feelings, Crowley didn’t want to know. And if he did, how could a demon ever be good enough for the angel?

For his part, Aziraphale was pondering the implications of Anathema’s warning to them. She’d obviously been worried enough about their safety to plant a charm in the Bentley—which would have been very odd if he hadn’t known that the Bentley, while not exactly _alive_, did by some miracle have a kind of intelligence. He supposed that after loyally carrying its demon driver about for over half a century, it had become attuned to Crowley and maybe some of his essence had even been imbued in the car. He glanced at Crowley now, oddly silent and frowning as if deep in thought as he drove. He was no doubt going over the case. Or, he was wondering which bottle of Aziraphale’s’ wine to crack open as soon as they got home, he thought with a small smile. 

_Home_. That was how the bookshop had felt since the failed Apocalypse. That was because Crowley had spent nearly every evening at the bookshop, often sleeping on the sofa when he didn’t feel like going back to his flat, or if they’d drunk too much. He rested his gaze on Crowley’s chiseled profile. He was so fond of the demon. _Fond_? Was that even the right word? He kept thinking of Miss Device’s warning, that they could be walking into a trap, and the thought of something happening to Crowley frightened him like a stab to the heart. Aziraphale did not fear discorporation nearly as much as he feared losing Crowley. How lonely would his life be without his sarcasm, moodiness, beautiful golden eyes, not to mention willingness to indulge every culinary whim of Aziraphale’s? Fondness wasn’t the right word after all. He loved Crowley, and if he was honest with himself, he was _in love_ with him.

Clearly, however, Crowley regarded Aziraphale as a very dear friend, his _best_ friend certainly, but no more. He knew how upset the demon been when he’d been injured, he’d even given him a chaste little kiss on top of his head. But a _romantic_ interest? Someone he might even make love to and marry one day? Hardly. No, Crowley deserved someone as exciting and beautiful as he was.

He certainly seemed interested in his new client—and why not? She was sleek, sophisticated and curvy where Aziraphale knew he was pudgy and frumpy at worst, soft and old-fashioned at best. Why would a suave, fast-living demon fall for him?

Crowley parked the Bentley in its usual illegal spot outside the bookshop.

“Let me go in first, angel,” cautioned Crowley as they approached the shop. 

“Oh good heavens, Crowley. “I’m not a frightened schoolgirl. And it’s hardly likely there’s another evil book thief waiting to knock me on the head as soon as I enter the shop.”

“Don’t argue with me, angel. I’m not risking it.”

They entered the shop, Aziraphale trailing Crowley, and Aziraphale flicked the light on and paused just inside the door as they assessed things. Neither of them sensed a supernatural presence, but of course Aziraphale hadn’t sensed anything until he’d been crept up on from behind. It occurred to Crowley that whoever or whatever they were dealing with might be adept at putting up shields.

“Let’s have a drink, angel,” said Crowley, wanting very much to put spooky things aside for the evening, knowing they’d be on their way to Blackthorne Manor in the morning.

They sat at the little table in the back room, Aziraphale automatically snapping two glasses into existence and waving a bottle of pinot onto the table. He poured them each a glass.

Crowley sat at the table across from Aziraphale and phoned his client. Aziraphale watched Crowley as he talked to Ms. Blackthorne. Apparently, she planned on meeting them at the mansion early tomorrow.

“You’ll be there in the morning?” said Crowley. “All right. Well yes, we’ll get there as soon as we’re able. Don’t worry, luv—oh, the note. The warning note you got in the mail? Yes, we weren’t able to find out much of anything.” He didn’t let on that they’d actually forgotten about it. “Today, in fact, we went to consult—_ow!_” Aziraphale had kicked him under the table. 

His shin throbbing, he glared at the angel who now frowned and shook his head at him. “Er, went to consult Mr. Fell’s dentist…yes. Yes, all right luv, see you tomorrow then.” He hung up.

“_Luv_?” Aziraphale questioned.

“It’s just a figure of speech—and what the _heaven_, angel? My leg!”

“I had to stop you from telling where we went today. After all, someone attempted to follow us. You simply never know…”

“What? You think your phone might be bugged by our mystery assailant? Or is it that you don’t trust Rebecca?” He rubbed at his hand absentmindedly and took a swig of his wine. Then another.

Aziraphale refilled his own wine glass, having drained it in nearly two gulps. 

“Look here Crowley, it’s just that--what if Miss Device is right, and this is all a trap?”

“Listen, angel, we’ve been over this. If someone wanted to summon me, they would have done it by now. Whoever stole that book, if it’s got my sigil and seal in it, they would have just used it and I’d be stuck in a circle now bargaining with some human conjurer. Like a genie in a bottle…” he shuddered. “And I don’t sense anything evil from Rebecca, do you? Seems lovely and vulnerable.”

Aziraphale bit back a sarcastic remark. His angelic nature led him to want to help the young woman as they’d promised to do. On the other hand, he bristled at the sound of her name. Crowley didn’t seem to mind at all that she’d fawned all over him and then practically made love to his hand. And he’d actually _kissed_ hers. 

“No,” he admitted, frowning and refilling his wine again. “Not evil.”

“Well then?” 

Aziraphale didn’t answer.

Crowley saw that they had drunk most of the first bottle of pinot, so he finished off the one and popped open another. He took several swigs straight from the bottle and stared at Aziraphale for a reaction. Aziraphale grabbed the bottle and filled his glass again, after miracling his glass to double the size.

They changed the conversation for a little while, chatting about the best wines they’d had through the ages. By the time the third bottle was empty, and they started on the fourth, their inhibitions were wearing down. Aziraphale was beginning to slur.

“Rebecca,” said Aziraphale out of the blue.

“Mmm?”

“Rebecca. Thass a first name. Firss name basis, Rebecca,” he repeated. “Not at all proper, you know.”

“Huh?” Crowley stared with his mouth hanging open. “Ohhh, I get it,” he said and guffawed. “You don’t like me calling my client by her firss name. Yoouuu,” he said, pointing his finger at the angel, “You are jealous.”

“Wha—I am not!” Aziraphale sulked and turned beet red. He’d been found out. “Why would I be jealous? Juss cuz you keep saying her name and you keep rubbing your hand where she touched you. An anyway, anyway…”

“Anyway?”

“Nothing,” pouted the angel. “Gonna sit on the sofa. Tired.”

He grabbed the bottle of wine and made his way tiltingly to the sofa. Crowley joined him there, a wave of remorse washing over him that he’d hurt his angel’s feelings. Plus, he suddenly realized how exhausted and drunk he actually was. He scooted a bit closer to Aziraphale so their hips were almost touching.

“Angel?”

“What?”

“S’okay.” He yawned and leaned against Aziraphale, who was soft and smelled nice, like spices and old books. He closed his eyes and after a few moments he muttered, “she’s not my type anyway. You are,” and drifted off to sleep, still leaning into the angel.

Aziraphale sat stunned for a moment. Then, he focused and sobered himself up, watching the wine bottle refill itself. His found his chest suddenly ached in a very pleasant way, and he smiled with tears in his eyes as he eased Crowley down so that he lay with his head in his lap. He miracled a soft tartan blanket over the demon and sat there, gently running his fingers through his soft red hair as he slept.

\-----------------------------------------------------

The next morning saw them up early, far earlier than Crowley was accustomed to, and Crowley woke up with a mild hangover. He woke up on the sofa, but Aziraphale was already up and fussing about in his tiny makeshift kitchen. He smelled something delicious and bready, and—was that coffee? Had the angel actually brewed _coffee_ for him? Aziraphale was smiling in an especially sunny manner this morning considering they were off to spend a night or two in a creepy mansion to solve a mystery. 

Crowley made his way over to sit at the kitchen table, trying for his usual cool saunter but failing. He was achy and decidedly _un_cool as he seemed to be wearing flannel tartan pajamas.

“Angel, did you actually change me into tartan pajamas in the night? Did I fall asleep drunk? And why are you so cheerful?” he scowled.

“Yes, yes, and I don’t know. It’s just a lovely morning,” smiled the angel, remembering what Crowley had let slip in his inebriated state last night. 

“_Lovely?_ Angel, it’s overcast, cold, gloomy and my head hurts.” And why was the angel grinning and looking at him like that?

“Here, my dear. Let me help you with that headache.” He came over and set a cup of black coffee down in front of the demon, and then touched his forehead to let his healing energy flow into him. He realized he was staring. He could never get enough of Crowley’s beautiful eyes.

“Ahem, yes. Well, then. Off to stay in a haunted mansion, then? You’re quite right about the weather, my dear. Perfect setting for it.”

They ate and Aziraphale threw together an overnight bag, and soon enough they were off. 

They popped by Crowley’s flat so that he could pack a bag—and of course, water and threaten his plants before leaving.

“You know what’s going to happen if I come back and find you lot _wilted_,” he growled at them, “or spotty.”

“Oh, Crowley my dear, look at the poor things. You’ve got this little fern positively trembling.” Aziraphale rushed over to stroke a finger over one if its fronds. “Now you have plenty of water and light, little one, so you stay nice and green while we’re gone, hmm?”

Crowley watched the angel silhouetted against the window, the morning light making his blond curls shine almost like a halo. His face was all love an innocence, his lips set in a soft little smile as he cooed at the plants. He swore they were leaning towards him like little children raptly listening to a story. How could he blame them? He wanted to grab that sweet face in his hands, stare into the angel’s ridiculous blue eyes and plant a kiss on those lips. And now that he knew Aziraphale had some kind of feelings for him, what was stopping him?

He sighed. It wasn’t just his own doubts about Aziraphale’s feelings toward him. Those blond curls had been blood soaked not two days ago—had it actually been only yesterday? All because Crowley had dragged him into his nonsense. And he’d been discorporated and his beloved shop burnt down ultimately because Crowley had talked him into helping him stop Armageddon. No matter how Aziraphale protested otherwise, Crowley was dangerous for the angel at worst, and at best he would never be good enough for him. 

How was he going to protect him when they were headed straight into—what, exactly? A haunted house? Far more likely a human sorcerer, with magic powerful enough to mask his presence. But why go to all the trouble of black magic and demonology to scare a young woman out of her inheritance? There must be something in that house worth the effort and he hated to think what that could be. And once again, Aziraphale would be dragged along into danger. 

The alternative was to leave the angel at the bookshop, where someone already knew he could be found. Crowley’s flat? But the angel would still undoubtedly run off to check on his books at some point anyway. Plus, for all Crowley knew his flat was no safer. 

No, he needed to know where Aziraphale was at all times. He could leave him with Anathema, of course, but the angel wasn’t a puppy or small child he could simply drop off at the sitter’s. Aziraphale was stubborn and seemed determined to come along and help Crowley solve a mystery. The only solution was to keep him close. And if he had to drop his human cover and go all fangs and claws to protect him, then so be it.

They drove along the countryside, Aziraphale for once sitting with his hands in his lap rather than gripping the roof handle or the dash. He fiddled with his hands and kept glancing over at Crowley. He was afraid for him. The idea that they might encounter a magician powerful enough to control demons or Summon a Duke of Hell—he shuddered. 

“What is it, angel? I know you want to ask me something.”

“Yes, well, it’s just—that book. It lists demons’ names and sigils—rather like a catalog, from what I gather. And someone with the right incantation and the sigil could summon any demon in the book. Crowley, tell me what happens when a demon is Summoned.” 

“I’ve seen it happen to other demons once or twice. It used to be far more common, but there are still groups of Satanists or even just stupid Halloween partygoers that decide to get together and Summon one of us for fun. Then more often than not, they’re not even sure what to do. But you have to have the sigil and seal to Summon a particular demon. I think that’s honestly why I’ve been lucky. I’m not high ranking enough to have my sigil published in a human demonology book. Hastur and Ligur are Dukes, Beelzebub’s a Prince, and I’m—well, I’m not sure what I’d be in the human equivalent of my ranking. I am the Serpent of Eden, after all, so I’m not just one of the rank-and-file demons. But I’m pretty sure I also don’t warrant a sigil in this Big Book of Demons or whatever it’s called—”

“The Lemegeton, or Lesser Key of Solomon, my dear.”

“Yeah, of course. Anyway, Hastur got Summoned once. We were gathered together in what humans could call a board meeting, actually. This was sometime around the early 1950’s, and I’d voted to add technology to the agenda. A new thing called television was coming out, and I thought it was a perfect chance to influence the humans—I had a lot to do with commercials, in fact. 

Anyway, right in the middle of Ligur reading the minutes from the last meeting, Hastur just—disappeared. When he turned up again a couple of days later, he reappeared naked, wings a bloody mess, and I swear to you angel, crying. Then the other demons had to gather round and jeer and taunt, of course. Much as I never could stand him, I actually felt sorry for the idiot. For Satan knows how long after, he was the butt of jokes anywhere he went. I overheard him telling Ligur that some cult had Summoned him. I didn’t hear what it was they forced him to do, but once they got it they clearly humiliated him before letting him go.”

Aziraphale reached over and placed his hand on Crowley’s shoulder. “My dear,” he reminded him, “The book that was stolen was a missing volume. Your sigil could be—”

“Angel, look—like I said, if it was then I would have been Summoned by now. I think whoever’s trying to scare Rebe—er, our client off is planning to Summon one or more of my nastier ex-colleagues. So, we need to find out and stop the wanker before that happens.” 

Soon enough, Crowley and Aziraphale found themselves on a winding road which passed through a forested area, then emerged at the bottom of a gentle slope. Here the road narrowed, winding up the hill through a heath. At the top of the slope was a house, a massive turreted beast of grey Gothic Revival. As they climbed up the hill on the narrow weed infested road, neither of them spoke. Finally, the hill levelled out, as if someone had sliced the top off it just to build the gloomy turreted structure that stood in the center. 

They crossed a small bridge on approaching the house, which lay over what once was a moat, now long dried out, that encircled the property.

“Bit pretentious, that,” commented Crowley.

“Indeed.”

By the time they neared the circular driveway, even the Bentley was spooked into playing Queen’s “Invisible Man.” 

_When you hear a sound_  
That you just can't place  
Feel somethin' move  
That you just can't trace…

“Don’t worry, old girl,” said Crowley. “It’s just a spooky old house.”

“Crowley, do you remember when we visited the old Satanic convent? You said something along the lines of, ‘I like spooky. Big spooky fan.’”

“I did say that, didn’t I?”

But as they parked the Bentley in the huge driveway and looked up at the stone house, with its pointed arches and steep pitched roof, even Crowley felt his stomach flutter just a little. The dark grey stone and Gothic Revival architecture screamed “haunted house,” as if right out of Central Casting. He couldn’t imagine turning this monster of a house into a Bed and Breakfast.

He and Aziraphale exited the car, grabbing their bags and pausing a moment to gaze up at the steeply pitched roof. Aziraphale looked up at the small dark window which sat just below the gabled roof. A white curtain hung in the window, and he knew if he stared at it any longer, he would see the curtain move. He quickly looked away with a nervous smile. 

“Well, I must say I feel haunted already and we haven’t even entered. You must feel positively eager to get inside, eh Crowley? You being a spooky fan?”

“Yeah, yeah of course, angel,” he said. In truth, Crowley wasn’t sure _what_ had come over him. He was a _demon_, for Satan’s sake. This kind of thing was his jam, as the Americans said. But as he stood absentmindedly itching at his hand, his brain screamed “don’t go in” while his feet compelled him to move toward the house. Aziraphale followed.

Then the front door opened, and a severe looking woman peered out of the gloom to beckon them inside.

“I’m Mrs. Monaghan,” she said. “Welcome to Blackthorne Manor.”


	7. Heaven Without You Would Be My Hell

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Most of the action in this chapter is romantic, but there are several important clues also!

They entered the foyer and Aziraphale was relieved to note there was a bit more natural light inside than it had first seemed. Morning light seeped in through the high windows, at least enough to illuminate the faded wallpaper and thin layer of white dust that lay on the sconces and portrait frames that were undoubtedly too high for Mrs. Monaghan to reach. 

“How do you do?” said Crowley politely. “I’m Anthony Crowley and this is my associate, Mr. Fell.”

“A pleasure, madam,” said Aziraphale. He saw she was peering very pointedly at Crowley’s face. He cleared his throat to catch Crowley’s attention and made a vague gesture to convey “glasses.”

“Ah, er, please excuse the sunglasses indoors,” said Crowley. “It’s my Unfortunate Eye Condition….” He looked to the angel for help.

“Yes,” he chimed in. “It’s a hereditary condition. Very sensitive to light. Mr. Crowley only removes his sunglasses in complete darkness, I’m afraid.”

“I see,” she said, lifting an eyebrow. “Well, if you gentlemen would take a seat in the parlor, I’ll let Miss Blackthorne know you are here.”

She led them into a small room off the foyer where there were a few cushioned chairs around a small mahogany table. Two large windows took up one wall, the other featuring a small fireplace and an oil painting above. It looked to be a portrait of an old man with a rather sour expression on his face. 

Aziraphale couldn’t help but think the face looked familiar. But surely that was his imagination?

“Uncle Silas, I suppose,” guessed Aziraphale.

“Looks like a right crusty old goat.”

“Crowley, honestly! He was the young lady’s uncle, after all.”

“C’mon, angel. You can be someone’s uncle and still be a crusty old—”

“Mr. Crowley, Mr. Fell, so good to see you.” 

They both startled and turned at the melodious voice of Rebecca Blackthorne, who had just walked into the room. She was dressed casually in jeans and a sweatshirt, her blond hair done up in a ponytail. She approached and took Crowley’s hand in both of hers, as she’d done back at the office. “Thank you both so much for coming to help me—and for staying the night,” she said, gazing into Crowley’s eyes as if she could see them under his sunglasses. Aziraphale stiffened.

“Oh, er—yes, of course,” stammered Crowley, realizing she’d probably heard his assessment of her uncle.

“Don’t worry,” she laughed, as if reading his mind. “Uncle Silas was a bit of a crusty old goat, even when he was younger. Still, he did leave me this house so I suppose I can’t complain much. Please forgive the way I look today, I’m doing a bit of cleaning and organizing. Though Mrs. Monaghan here has done a wonderful job of keeping the house up.”

The housekeeper had returned, standing near the lady of the house and wearing a slight scowl. She did not seem to appreciate the compliment.

“Shall I show the gentlemen to their rooms, ma’am?”

“Yes, thank you. We have two rooms with an adjoining door—they weren’t used very much, since Silas didn’t have many visitors. I hope you gentlemen will be comfortable. Please feel free to wander about the house and get familiar with things. We’ll meet later, perhaps after lunch, and you can fill me in on anything you’ve learned. We’ll also dine together, of course—I’ll be so glad to have company tonight, otherwise I don’t think I could sleep.” She shuddered visibly.

Mrs. Monaghan led them upstairs to their rooms. Each one was decorated in the overstuffed style of a century ago, all dark wood and deep velvety fabrics, but obviously recently cleaned. Both had comfortable looking beds and a table with two chairs for breakfasting. Crowley looked longingly at his bed.

Aziraphale unlocked and opened their adjoining door almost immediately after carefully putting away his few personal items and pajamas.

“I may just have a little lie down before tea,” said Crowley, rubbing his forehead and flexing his hand. “I know we should probably start snooping around, but I’m a little achy. Can’t believe I would still have a hangover from last night.”

“You do look a bit wrung out. But you were quite inebriated, my dear. Tell me, do you remember anything much about last night? You fell asleep almost instantly on the sofa.”

“And woke up finding myself in those ridiculous tartan pajamas,” he complained. He frowned. “Nope, we were talking about wine, I think, but I know we were _drinking_ lots of wine, and somehow, we ended up on your sofa—and then I woke up wearing flannel jammies. Why, did I say anything stupid?”

_She’s not my type, you are_…Aziraphale smiled, thinking of how the demon had rested his head on his lap as he slept. 

“No, not at all. You just said you were tired and drifted off. I made sure you were comfortable and I stayed up reading. You know, dearest, I don’t generally need sleep. If you like you can take a little nap and I’ll wake you.”

“That’d be great, angel.” And with that, he retired to his bed and flopped down after removing only his shoes and his sunglasses. He closed his eyes, and was definitely _not_ smiling contentedly because the angel had called him “dearest.”

Left to his own for an hour, Aziraphale decided to wander about the upper floor. He stepped out to peer over the dark wood banister, which overlooked the main hall downstairs. The home had certainly once been a charming and elegant mansion. Beautiful crown molding adorned the top of every wall, there were elegant portraits and furniture everywhere, and the home really only needed cosmetic refurbishing. Rugs covered much of the floor, which looked to be the original wood. The floors were in sore need of refurbishing or replacing. The wood was remarkably scratched, with deep grooves in all angles, curved and straight, as though decades of furniture had been moved carelessly over it. The rugs were obviously thrown about to hide the damage, but the strategy only partly succeeded.

He walked along the hall until he reached a room which looked to be the library or perhaps Silas’s private study. The walls here were painted a deep forest green, and dark wood bookshelves graced two of the walls from ceiling to floor, though the wall to the left featured a small fireplace in the center with two portraits hanging above it. 

One of the portraits looked like a younger version of Silas, and the other was of a striking pale young woman with flowing auburn hair and black eyes which seemed to bore into Aziraphale from across the room. The small brass plaques under each portrait confirmed his suspicions—Silas Blackthorne and Lydia Blackthorne. So she was the witch, the practitioner of black magic.

He tore his eyes away from her gaze and turned to the bookshelves. He could spend the better part of a day in the library, but he checked his watch to make sure he didn’t let Crowley oversleep. He’d looked exhausted, poor thing. He knew biologically the demon didn’t really require sleep, but on some level he’d always needed it anyway. Aziraphale’s mouth turned up in a little smile, thinking of the times he’d curled up on the old sofa in the bookshop and drifted off, waking up later with his red hair mussed. He could never, of course, tell the Serpent of Eden how cute he looked when he slept.

He turned his attention to the leather-bound books on the right wall. Many were legal volumes, along with a set of classic literature, including the complete works of Shakespeare. Amongst the classics such as _Moby Dick_ and _The Canterbury Tales_, he was not surprised to find _Frankenstein_ and _Dr. Faustus_.

Before delving into the books surrounding the fireplace, he moved to the window and peered out. He could see the grounds which stretched out to the dry moat and even beyond. A small cottage which must belong to the caretakers lay slightly to the left. Aziraphale could see little of the bottom of the moat, though a dark sandy soil covered the bottom. It looked as though it had been dry for a very long time. 

The shelves on the fireplace wall featured a more interesting, if disturbing collection than the other shelves. There were books on religions and cults of the world, folktales and fairy tales, but also books on voodoo, witchcraft and magic. The books here were not all leather bound. There were many with cloth binding, some looking as if they were in sore need of repair. One in particular caught Aziraphale’s attention. 

It was a thick book with faded brown cloth binding. The gold embossed letters on the spine read, _The Historie and Art of Dark Magick. _ He drew it out carefully, not wanting to damage the spine. A chill crept up his hand and he quickly set the book down on the table. A small wave of nausea swept over him and he realized it was the effect of touching the book, likely filled with spells of black magic. He very much wanted to flip through the volume but it would have to wait for Crowley. He quickly returned the book and sat for a moment in one of the upholstered chairs in front of the fireplace. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply until he felt better. 

When he opened his eyes, he looked down to find that a folded piece of paper had fallen on the floor. It must have fluttered out of the book. He opened it tentatively. There were symbols and letters in a strange script scribbled in the margins, and he would have studied it more but he glanced at his watch. He was shocked to find he’d spent nearly an hour in the library. He tucked the paper in his pocket.

He returned to his room, shutting the door behind. He had better wake up Crowley else he’d sleep the day away. They were supposed to be detecting _together_, after all.

He entered Crowley’s room through the adjoining door. The demon was still asleep. He had gripped the coverlet in his sleep and he was laying on his side, clearly in an uneasy slumber. He was muttering something, but Aziraphale couldn’t make out the words. He couldn’t help but watch the demon sleep for just a few moments before waking him. He was so beautiful, especially with his red hair rumpled like that.

He did have a “thing,” as Crowley would say, for his lovely fiery locks, especially now that he had grown them out a bit. Before he could stop himself, he sat on the edge of the bed and tentatively smoothed back a lock of hair that had fallen into his face.

Crowley shifted a bit, frowning now, and groaning a bit in his sleep. “Rebecca,” he muttered. “Where? Rebecca…” and then back to unintelligible noises.

Aziraphale drew his hand back as if he’d been bitten, and he felt his eyes sting.

_Ah, of course_. 

Last night when Crowley had spoken those few words of affection and fallen asleep nestled into his lap, he had merely been drunk. That explained it. He felt like such a fool, what had he been thinking? That Crowley would find _him_ more attractive than their curvaceous young client?

“Angel?” Crowley said sleepily. He yawned, stretched, and scooted himself up so that he was seated next to Aziraphale on the bed. He rubbed his eyes for a moment and then looked at the angel. Something was wrong. 

Crowley frowned. Aziraphale had been perfectly fine when he’d left his room, but now he looked miserable, not meeting Crowley’s eyes but staring straight ahead with his shoulders sagging. Good Someone, was that an actual tear forming on the corner of the angel’s eye?

“Angel, what’s wrong?” he asked in alarm. “Did you find something out when I was asleep?”

“Find something?” Aziraphale repeated, looking down at the floor as if the rug were suddenly of keen interest to him. “Oh, while I was—no, nothing much. I’ll show you on our way downstairs. Saw a portrait of a younger Silas and Lydia. Found a possible clue, perhaps.”

“But you’re upset. Something’s wrong, and don’t tell me it’s some clue you found.”

“No, I’m fine. Just a little tired. I probably should have rested myself, you know.”

“Angel,” said Crowley, frowning, “As a demon I am an expert at lying and I _know_ when you’re lying. What’s wrong? And I’ll know if you’re not telling me the truth.”

Aziraphale hardly wanted to tell Crowley how he felt about him and risk humiliation. Was he really going to declare his love and have to watch Crowley’s shocked face? And then he would reply that he was flattered, but let’s just be friends. If Crowley was attracted to the lovely human woman, it was laughable to think of him wanting a stuffy, bookish angel. 

Still, it seemed it was too late at this point to try to hide his feelings. It was probably best to clear the air and be done with it, consequences be damned. He only hoped it wouldn’t ruin their friendship. 

“You were muttering in your sleep,” he finally said. “You kept saying her name.”

“Whose name? Angel, _tell me_.”

“Hers…Rebecca,” he said through tight lips, as if he could barely stand to say it.

Crowley was stunned. The angel looked so crushed. Had he said her name? But why the heaven—and then he remembered he’d been dreaming. Only fragments of the dream remained in his head, but it had been a bad dream. There had been a scream, a scream of a young woman, and he’d been drifting through the dark hallways of a house as if floating…

“Angel, you don’t understand. I wasn’t—I had a nightmare.”

“It’s all right, Crowley,” said Aziraphale, ignoring him and looking down at his hands which were nervously clasped together and fumbling. “I know how attractive she is. It’s just, when you’d drunk too much last night you leaned into me, and you said—well, never mind. I suppose after all this time I’d gotten my hopes up that you would feel the same way I do. As I said, you’d been drinking so that explains it…” he trailed off. Worse, he glanced at Crowley and smiled that brave little smile of his which said, _I’m really hurting but you’re more important than me_.

So it was true. Aziraphale _did_ love him, truly. The jealousy thing was real. But how could it be? How could his perfect angel be in love with him, a demon who’d once crawled on his belly and caused the Fall of Mankind? A demon who caused nothing but mayhem for the angel—the angel who loved nothing better than to putter with his books and enjoy haute cuisine, not to be dragged into danger. But if it were true—

Crowley turned toward the angel and gently reached his hand out to cup his face.

“Hey. Turn your head and _look_ at me, angel.” 

Aziraphale obeyed, but still avoided his gaze. A little tear was just starting to trickle down his face. Crowley wiped it away tenderly and before he could think about it, he leaned over and kissed Aziraphale gently, just enough to taste his sweet mouth for a moment. Then he drew away.

Aziraphale met his eyes then, looking at him in wonder.

“Why did you…”

“Angel, I don’t care a fig about anyone else, not in that way.”

“You don’t?” he said tentatively. It was too much to hope. “But then why—”

“Why did I say the human’s name in my sleep? I dunno. I was having a nightmare, actually. I was floating through the house, I think this one, and I heard screams, and—Honestly, angel, how could you think I’d fall for some human woman I’d barely met?”

“Oh, Crowley, a nightmare. How awful. But of course, I thought you’d fallen for her, as you say. You keep touching your hand where she touched you, and you call her by her first name, and you kissed her hand. She’s beautiful and elegant and I’m—well, a bit of a fuddy-duddy. Besides, after all the millennia, if you had feelings for me, why didn’t you say anything?”

“Well, how was I supposed to know?” said Crowley, a bit harsher than he’d wanted. He sighed. “Look, we’ve been friends all this time. Best friends. I’ve always known I was your friend, even when you denied it.” Aziraphale flinched a bit at this.

“I couldn’t risk ruining that by telling you the truth of how I felt. The truth is I’ve loved you since you told me you gave that bloody flaming sword away, but I wasn’t going to confess my love to an angel, was I? You’re perfect and I’m—well, I’m Fallen. Literally disgraced. All I’m good for is dragging you into danger, getting your bookshop burned and you discorporated, then bashed over the head and nearly discorporated again. Every time I get a stupid idea, I drag you along with me and you get hurt. I’m no good for you, angel.”

This time it was Crowley who hung his head miserably. He shouldn’t have kissed him. It was selfish. He should have let the angel think he liked this human woman, and he would have stayed away from him more. Crowley would be lonely, but that’s what he deserved. It was better than constantly messing up Aziraphale’s life. 

“_Crowley_,” said the angel sternly. “Now you look at me.”

Crowley, surprised at the tone, looked up to see Aziraphale’s hard expression. “Have you forgotten the conversation we had at the bookshop? Where you _took care_ of me and nursed me, by the way? Remember you apologizing to me for dragging me into danger, and my telling you that you’re a good and worthy person, and how dull my life would be without you? Well, obviously you have forgotten.” He sighed, and his expression softened a bit as he continued.

“Do you think we’d be sitting here now if it weren’t for you? Yes, while we were stopping Armageddon my bookshop got burnt, and I was temporarily discorporated, but Adam fixed all that. And yes, Heaven isn’t pleased with me any more than Hell is pleased with you. But if you hadn’t phoned me and then worked your hardest to convince me to help you stop the world from ending, the planet would be a wasteland right now—and I’d be sitting up in Heaven listening to the Sound of Music for all eternity. Without you. And an eternity without you would be unbearable, my dear. Heaven without you would be my Hell.”

Now it was Aziraphale’s turn. He put his soft hands on either side of Crowley’s face, and with his thumbs smoothed away the tears that had begun to flow from the demon’s beautiful yellow eyes. 

“I’m so sorry, dear, that I ever said you weren’t my friend,” said Aziraphale. “You’ve been so much more than that, always. I’d been falling in love with you from the start too—from the time we met on the Eastern wall and you huddled under my wing because you were afraid of the rain, and then your rescuing me from the guillotine—and when you rescued my books for me at the church, well, I lost my heart completely then, as they say.”

With no further words the angel kissed him, and found the kiss returned with passion. It was awkward at first, but then they slowed as they explored each other’s mouths, each of them making soft little noises. They nibbled each other’s lips playfully, and with their tongues explored the taste of each other’s mouths, Aziraphale’s like cocoa and cinnamon, Crowley’s like exotic spices. They embraced, their hands unbuttoning and untucking shirts for better access to bare skin. _Finally_, both of them thought.

The heat rose between them as they kissed and caressed each other’s skin, and Crowley’s lips wandered to Aziraphale’s neck. They continued for who knows how long, all hands and lips and tongue, wanting to meld with each other...until there was an ill-timed knock at the door.

_Of all the—now?_ Crowley groaned, and Aziraphale sighed in frustration. 

“Just a moment,” he called. The two of them jumped up giggling like guilty teenagers who’d been caught making out in their car, tucking in and smoothing their clothes. He put on his glasses and looked at Aziraphale, who was very flushed and flustered and decided to scurry back to his room, closing the adjoining door behind him.

He went to answer the door, painfully aware of the bulge in his trousers. He hid his body behind the door and peeked his head around to address the intruder. 

It was Mrs. Monaghan.


	8. Closing In

_Crowley went to answer the door, painfully aware of the bulge in his trousers. He hid his body behind the door and peeked his head around to address the intruder. _

_It was Mrs. Monaghan._

“Yes?” he asked.

“I’ve brought a tea tray for you and Mr. Fell, since dinner will be quite some time from now.”

“Uh, oh, well, certainly,” he stammered. He focused and brought up enough infernal energy to miracle his erection away. 

The adjoining door opened suddenly and Aziraphale stepped into the room looking smoothed over, if still glowing a bit. Leave it to the angel to sense a tea tray arriving in the next room, passionate interlude or no.

“Oh, how delightful, Mrs. Monaghan. I was just feeling a bit peckish, to be truthful. Crowley, do let her in.”

Aziraphale was overly cheerful, hoping the housekeeper wouldn’t somehow divine what the two of them had been up to moments ago.

Crowley realized he was still hiding behind the mostly closed door, and he stepped away to let the housekeeper in. Mrs. Monaghan entered with her tray and sat it down on the small table in the corner by the window. She turned as if to leave, but Crowley thought this might be a good chance to do some actual detecting by asking her a question.

“Mrs. Monaghan,” he said. “Ms. Blackthorne has told us of the strange noises at night—footsteps, eerie voices, that sort of thing. Have you experience any odd occurrences? I know you’ve spent far more time in this house than she has.”

The housekeeper’s stern countenance morphed into one of worry, or perhaps even fear.

“The worse goings-on happened when Mrs. Blackthorne, Lydia, was still alive. I made sure never to be in the house at night. That was back when my parents were caretakers here.”

“You mean, you grew up here?” asked Crowley incredulously.

“Oh yes, sir. I was a child here. My husband and I took over just after we were married, after my parents died in a car crash. I was only 20 at the time, back in 1955 it was. That’s when Mr. Blackthorne married _her_, Lydia. They seemed like any happy young couple for the first few months. But then, I noticed changes in their behavior—especially hers. She grew colder and haughtier every day. I became very nervous to be around her. And soon after that was when I’d start hearing unholy noises at night. Things that chilled my blood. After that, I would only stay in the house in daylight hours. After dinner, I’d only stay in our little cottage with my husband.” 

“Fascinating,” said Crowley. “What kind of noises?”

She shuddered. “Moaning, wild laughter, banging about—noises that always seemed to come from below the house, from the basement. Once or twice, unholy screaming but like from a distance. I never went down those basement stairs after that madness started, not unless it was daylight and Mr. Monaghan went with me. This went on for years. There would be quiet for a while, and then it would start up again. I never knew what the masters of the house were doing down there. Then Lydia passed on, and all was quiet again. Mr. Blackthorne never remarried, though his wife died young.”

She paused and seemed lost in thought for a moment before making a very odd statement. “Silas Blackthorne never really left this house.”

And then, suddenly Mrs. Monaghan seemed to remember herself and snapped back into her role as housekeeper. Her familiar stern expression returned.

“Excuse me, gentlemen,” she said. “I must return to my duties. And your tea will be growing cold.” She nodded at the tray.

She turned to leave and as she exited the room she looked back, an inexplicable twinge of fear returning to her eyes. 

“Oh, I’ve left you the London paper. I know you detectives will find the crime pages to be of _particular_ interest. And gentlemen, all is not as it seems in this house. That is all I have to say.” She closed the door behind her.

“Well,” said Crowley after the door was closed, “that was a _thing_.”

But Aziraphale had already settled at the little table with the tea tray, pouring tea as he nibbled on a finger sandwich. “Do sit with me, Crowley. I’m famished. And you could do with a spot of tea. Especially after being nearly ravished by an angel,” he teased.

Crowley removed his sunglasses and tried for his best leer. “I was just getting started.”

Aziraphale beamed, blushing a deep pink. He’d never been happier, despite the spooky atmosphere, not even when they’d celebrated their averting of Armageddon victory at the Ritz. There would be no more hiding their feelings.

“I would love to continue, dear,” said Aziraphale, blue eyes dancing. “Still, there’s work to be done, yes?”

Crowley sat across the small table and had a cup of black tea while he watched Aziraphale nibble tiny sandwiches and biscuits. He flipped absentmindedly through the paper, but he found watching Aziraphale more entertaining. He was transfixed as he watched the angel lick and suck the cream off his finger from one of the custard filled biscuits. Aziraphale giggled.

“Crowley, you look like a snake that’s been charmed.”

“Well I have been, angel,” he smiled, making him blush again. “I do love watching you eat, you make it look almost sensual. Look, I suppose if you’ve finished your nosh, we _should_ do a bit of actual detecting. You went exploring while I slept, didn’t you?”

“Yes, I found the library—” said Aziraphale, still reeling from the knowledge that Crowley found his eating to be sensual.

“Of course, you found the library,” teased Crowley.

“—and I found a collection of quite disturbing volumes on magic and witchcraft. One of them had the same effect on me as the one stolen from my shop. When I touched it, I felt cold and rather ill. Oh, I just remembered, the paper…”

Aziraphale remembered the piece of paper he’d stuffed into his pocket, the one that had fallen from the book. He wiped his fingers carefully on a napkin and drew the paper out of his pocket. When he unfolded it and Crowley gazed upon it, Aziraphale was stunned at the frozen expression of shock on his face.

“What—where did you get this again?” stammered Crowley.

“It fell out of a book. I can show you. Crowley, what’s wrong? What is it?” The demon looked positively shaken.

“Aziraphale, those symbols. This is _Hastur’s_ sigil. And the spell to summon him.”

“Hastur? But why on Earth would his sigil be here of all places?”

“Aziraphale, would you say this paper could be around fifty years old?”

He looked at the slightly fragile yellowed paper and nodded. “Yes, easily.”

“Angel, remember when I told you Hastur was Summoned by someone back in the 1950s? I know it’s a coincidence but what if it was old Silas? Well, younger Silas I suppose and his witchy wife Lydia?”

“That would be a bit of a coincidence, wouldn’t it?

“Angel, think about it. Why would a page with Hastur’s sigil show up here? And Rebecca and Mrs. M. did say that it was a long time ago that the strange noises in the house and then Lydia’s death happened.”

“It does fit the time frame,” admitted Aziraphale. 

“Angel, let me see that book, the one this paper fell out of.”

“Certainly, dear. The library is just across on the other side.”

Crowley chucked the newspaper aside without a further glance, put his glasses back on and gave his angel a light squeeze and a peck on the cheek as they left the room. 

If the demon had paid close attention to the paper, he would have noticed the small item buried on page 6 at the bottom of the crime reports—the one-paragraph story titled, _Mystery Continues in Missing Persons Case_. The story began, “Ms. Rebecca Blackthorne of London, who disappeared nearly a month ago from her flat in London…”

Once in the library, Crowley was drawn immediately to the portrait of Lydia. Her intense gaze seemed to bore into him as it had Aziraphale, even though it was just a painting. He shivered and directed his gaze to Aziraphale, who was chattering on about the books. He was pointing to the shelves to the left of the window.

“…and this collection, as I mentioned, seems to focus on all manner of magic and witchcraft. Crowley, are you all right?” He looked with concern at the demon, whose face seemed pinched and pale.

“Yeah, yeah angel, just tired, you know.”

Aziraphale realized he was also feeling a bit more fatigued than usual. 

“I feel it too. It may be the atmosphere of the place,” he pondered. “I’ve read about such things, about how the energy of a place can drain one’s stores, so to speak. I wonder if the negative vibrations here are having a similar effect on us.”

“Like a battery being drained,” said Crowley. But surely, they should be immune to such things?

“Oh, Crowley, look. This is the book from which the summoning page fell.”

Crowley pulled out _The Historie and Art of Dark Magick _from the shelf. He understood why the book had affected Aziraphale physically as it had. It seemed to resonate with the same dark energy that had clung to the book that was stolen from his shop.

He flipped through the book, which blathered on for the first half about the history of black magic, to the point at which a ribbon marker was stuck on a page. It was a page on demon summoning, and Crowley guessed this was where the paper with Hastur’s sigil had fallen out. He looked more closely and his suspicion was confirmed. The torn edge on the paper matched a missing page from the book.

“Angel, the page with Hastur’s sigil was torn out of this book. There are some summoning spells in here, but only for the higher ranks like Dukes of Hell. Though why _he_ gets to be a Duke has always been beyond me,” he added. “Look, that time I told you about Hastur being summoned—I think it was actually creepy old Silas and his wife. It’s not like there are copies of Hastur’s summoning spells and sigil just floating around bookshops and the internet. Someone here took specific interest in tearing out this page.”

“But you said you’d overheard him telling Ligur it was a _cult_ that summoned him.”

“Yeah, but for all we know it could’ve been Silas and Lydia wearing black hooded robes in the basement. Same difference. Hastur would’ve thought it was a cult.”

Aziraphale nodded, but then looked at his watch. 

He was shocked to find the afternoon getting away from them. It was time to explore the rest of the house, perhaps get some fresh air.

“Let’s go downstairs, dear. We have more exploring to do.”

“Yeah, good idea angel. I need a change of scenery. Come to think of it, we should probably check out the basement where Mrs. M. said all the spookiness was happening back in the day.” Crowley sauntered out of the room and stood at the railing, absentmindedly looking down at the hall below them as Aziraphale had done earlier. His glance fell to the scraped and scratched wood floors below.

“Angel, did you notice the floors?” he frowned. The angel had joined him and stood by his side.

“Why yes, very observant of you. They’re in terrible shape, aren’t they? Look at all the deep grooves. The rugs don’t hide them all. “Crowley? Something wrong?” 

Crowley had gone stiff, his eyes widening under his glasses. “Angel,” he croaked. “They’re not just ordinary—oh, for Hell’s…”

He dashed around to the stairs and ran down them, Aziraphale on his heels. “What? What is it, my dear?” he asked, perplexed by the demon’s sudden erratic behavior.

Crowley grabbed at the rugs, tugging at them furiously and dragging them to the side as Aziraphale watched, puzzled. “Angel, give me a hand here.”

The two of them pulled several of the larger rugs away and to the side. Even so, they couldn’t get to them all. Rugs covered the scratched floors not just in the great hall, but all through the bottom floor of the house. Crowley ran to the entry, to the sitting room—the marks peered out from every rug. But he had pulled away enough to confirm his suspicions. The patterns on the floor where they pulled the rug up were all too familiar. The scratches on the floor were not accidental scratches made over decades of time. They formed shapes, patterns, letters in a long dead language.

“Angel,” he said in a low voice, trying not to rise into panic and failing. “These marks. Look at them.” 

“Oh dear,” Aziraphale remarked, his eyes widening in alarm as he realized the nature of the patterns that had been scratched into the floors, all throughout the house.

They were symbols. Symbols that were commonly used in sigils.

Outside, the Bentley stirred. She had been slumbering, if a car could be said to slumber, but something had disturbed her slumber. The charm that Anathema had placed in her glovebox, the little bundle of herbs with a tiny spell scroll and a lock each of angel and demon hair, was tingling unpleasantly. Her driver and the regular passenger, the one that always grabbed the roof and yelled things like “Watch out!” and “Pedestrian!” were in some kind of trouble. 

She could feel the tendril of panic from her driver, from somewhere inside the big house, and it was activating the magic in the charm. 

It sent out vibrations, tendrils that snaked their way through the Bentley directing her actions. She needed to get help now. One tendril coiled its way to the ignition, switching it on. The Bentley knew where she needed to go. She rolled as quietly as she could out of the driveway, pointed toward the drawbridge over the moat. 

But the drawbridge had begun to lift. In seconds it would be too late and the Bentley would be trapped on the wrong side of the moat. She had to take a chance.

She revved her engine and sped over the drawbridge, bracing for impact as she flew over the edge of the drawbridge which had raised several feet into the air. She landed hard but safe on the other side, and raced down the road toward Tadfield.

Inside the house, Crowley stood still, and then he began to pace frantically back and forth, waving his hands about. “Sigils. They’re sigils. They’re meant to trap demons. Angel, I need to get out of here. _We need to get out_…”

He could his heart was pounding hard in his chest, his breath coming faster and faster, his hands shook—

And then he felt arms around him. 

Aziraphale was hugging him tight. If anyone walked in on them like this, the angel didn’t care. He’d never seen Crowley panic like this, never seen him let down his sarcastic, swaggering façade except in extreme moments of crisis. He knew the demon was terrified of being trapped.

Crowley let himself be held, his arms around the angel’s comfortable waist, listening to him make soothing noises. He knew he’d be embarrassed beyond belief if the humans caught him like this, but he wanted—_needed_—to cling to his angel a few moments more. 

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Aziraphale murmured. “I’m taking you outside, dearest. Let’s go get some air. And then you can see we’re not trapped. All right?” The angel kept his arms around Crowley, holding him until he felt his heart begin to calm.

But the moment was interrupted by the faint sound of an engine roaring into life, from somewhere outside the front. It was a familiar noise, one that Crowley recognized instantly. 

_The Bentley_.

They broke apart and ran outside to see two things. The Bentley was gone, and the drawbridge had been raised. It was now flush up against the house, having been pulled up by the old-fashioned chain mechanism. The question was, who had raised it? 

Crowley wandered toward the edge of the clearing where the drawbridge had been moments ago. He could still see the dust settling on the other side where the Bentley had landed and gone roaring off. 

Crowley walked toward the edge of the dry moat, which was narrow as far as moats went but wide and deep enough to make it impassable. He wondered why nobody had filled it in with dirt. He made his way closer, taking care not to get too close to the edge, where the brick was loose and looking like it might crumble away.

But he needn’t have worried. 

Within a mere yard of the edge, the air thickened strangely. He tried to move forward just a little, and it was as if the air had become nearly solid. It was like wading through thick mud. He could move no further. 

He focused as best he could with his serpentine eyes, and it looked as though the air had solidified. He got the sense of looking through cellophane.

Panic threatened to well up inside him. The moat encircled the property. He walked along the edge a short ways and back again, to test his theory. 

“Aziraphale!” he called.

Something in Crowley’s voice alarmed the angel. “Crowley? What is it?”

“Come here a moment, will you? Come stand next to me and face the moat. Now put your arm out and walk forward a step or two. And look. Tell me what you see and feel.” He found himself trembling again.

The angel obeyed, and his chest tightened. Aziraphale’s arm hit a transparent barrier. He could detect the glimmer in the air, the sense that an invisible wall surrounded them, and it corresponded with the moat. 

He now recognized that the dark sediment which he had noticed earlier on the bottom of the moat was likely black salt. He had read about it. It was often used by witches to create circles, normally to keep the practitioner safe from harm--or in this case, as he suspected, to trap supernatural entities inside.

It was undeniable. The entire property lay inside a magic circle which they could not escape.

“So much for not being trapped,” Crowley said, trying for humor but his cracked voice betraying his emotions.

But they were startled into action once again as a piercing scream sounded from inside the house. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know things are looking a bit more dire for these two, and I'm working on the next update as fast as I can. Fair warning, there will be some serious whumping ahead for our poor boys. Things will get worse before they will get better. Thanks so much for the kudos and kind comments so far!


	9. Ring of Fire

They dashed toward the house, or rather Aziraphale dashed. Crowley’s heart pounding wildly as half stumbled, half ran. The demon was still reeling from the knowledge that they were trapped by something or someone unknown. 

Aziraphale was halfway to the front door when he realized Crowley had stopped, frozen in his tracks, and was looking at something off to the side of the house. They were heading toward the house at an angle, coming from the northeast part of the grounds from where they had walked part of the circle’s perimeter. 

Crowley was staring toward the southeast corner of the house and when Aziraphale followed his gaze he could see the bumper of a car, just visible behind some bushes. It was a red Bentley GT.

“Angel, the car,” croaked the demon. “Why is that car here?”

“I don’t know,” said Aziraphale. “But we’ll find out.” He carefully did not betray his emotions or the way his stomach lurched at the thought that one of the three humans on the property—the Monaghans or Ms. Blackthorne herself—could have been their pursuers in the red car, and then essentially their captors as the moat entrapment circle would indicate.

Aziraphale took Crowley’s hand and they continued to the house. He was worried about the demon. He was afraid he was going to unravel if they didn’t think of a way out of this. For now, however, they had a duty to fulfill, and for some reason he felt it important for them not to let on that they’d discovered the circle.

“It will be all right, my dear,” Aziraphale said. “Let’s sort this out and then we’ll find a way to break the circle. For now, we must play along, as it were. Now, I do believe that scream came from the parlor.”

It was the same little room they had entered that morning, and the situation was immediately apparent. Rebecca stood looking at them, clearly shaken, the portrait of old Silas Blackthorne having crashed to the floor. The frame and the glass had cracked from having fallen. The old man’s sour expression seemed to chastise them from the canvas, scowling at them for his having fallen off the wall.

“I—I was in here going through some things,” she stammered, “and suddenly, the portrait—it came crashing down from the wall. It startled me so badly… I’m sorry I screamed like that. Were the two of you outside?”

“Yes,” answered Aziraphale. “We were simply getting some air.” He squeezed Crowley’s hand, which he realized he was still holding, to signal him not to say more.

He certainly thought it would be imprudent to tell Ms. Blackthorne that they’d been outside to find their car gone and to discover that they were now trapped in a giant invisible summoning circle—because, incidentally, he and Crowley were two supernatural beings.

The young woman was so distraught, surely she couldn’t be a part of whatever dark magic rituals had gone on in the house? But if not Ms. Blackthorne, then who? Aziraphale recalled Mrs. Monaghan’s odd remark about Silas never having left the house. 

Still, if Rebecca Blackthorne somehow had a hand in their entrapment, he didn’t want to tip her off that they knew. And if she was innocent, she would think them raving mad if they told her the truth. No, best to “play it cool,” as Crowley would say. He would tell her everything except their discovery of the moat/entrapment circle.

Crowley seemed to understand Aziraphale’s squeeze of his hand. If Ms. Blackthorne noticed anything unusual about the “detectives” holding hands, she didn’t indicate it.

“We heard your scream,” Aziraphale continued. “Are you all right?”

“Yes, the only damage was to Uncle Silas’ portrait,” she said with a small smile, almost apologetically. “I feel a bit silly now, but I was in here and I thought it felt suddenly very cold in the room. It was as if the temperature had dropped twenty degrees. I was starting to feel unnerved, and then suddenly the picture just dropped off the wall and crashed. I don’t understand why.”

He looked over at Crowley, who was still pale and shaken. He knew the demon, like him, was far more concerned about their being trapped than he was about mysterious falling portraits. Still, they had a job to do.

Aziraphale extracted his hand from Crowley’s, which was still trembling, and went to examine the back of the portrait and then the spot on the wall from which it fell. The nail was not bent, the wire on the back of the portrait had not broken. There was nothing to indicate why the painting would have simply fallen off the wall.

“I don’t see anything that would have caused it to fall on its own,” said Aziraphale. 

Aziraphale studied the portrait again, under the cracked frame. 

He’d thought the man in the painting looked familiar the first time he’d seen it, that very morning. Now a scene began unfolding in his mind. 

He’d been in the book shop just two days ago, the same day he’d gotten a call from Crowley inviting him over to see his new office. The same day he was later attacked in his shop. That morning there had been very few customers, exactly three in fact. 

There had been the American tourist couple, and there had been an old man who’d been browsing the history section. 

The same old man in the portrait.

“My dear, I think we should sit down somewhere and talk,” he said. If Rebecca were truly their innocent client, she needed to know about the spell book and Silas.

He noticed the demon’s hands were still shaking slightly.

“Yes, I’d like to hear what you’ve found out as well,” Rebecca agreed. She indicated the small table and chairs on the other side of the room. Make yourselves comfortable here in the parlor and I’ll fetch something to drink. Tea? Sherry?”

“_Definitely_ sherry,” said Crowley, speaking for the first time. “I need something stronger than tea.”

“Tea is fine for me,” said Aziraphale. 

“I’ll get the drinks for us,” said Rebecca and then, oddly, reached over and took Crowley’s hand, holding it for a second as she’d done before. “You look tired, Mr. Crowley. I hope you’re all right.”

Once Rebecca had left the room and was out of earshot, Aziraphale turned to Crowley, who was still pale. His hands had stopped shaking, however. 

Aziraphale couldn’t help wondering about the connection—why had his hands calmed after Rebecca touched him? She’d done the same thing repeatedly, touching Crowley’s hand when they’d first met and again earlier this morning. Was it merely flirting? At least now he knew he needn’t worry in that regard.

But he was worried about Crowley. He looked unusually fragile at the moment. They needed to think of a way out of here.

Aziraphale felt nearly sick at the idea that the entire moat surrounding the house was a containment circle. At least the Bentley had gotten away before the drawbridge—

_The drawbridge_. _Of course_.

“Crowley, listen. We need to lower the drawbridge. It should break the circle! Think about it, the drawbridge was down when we entered. If it crosses the moat it should break the seal and we can escape over it.”

“Drawbridge?” asked Crowley, who had been in a bit of a fog. “Drawbridge. I suppose so,” he frowned. 

“Oh, but angel, we can’t. We can’t just leave Rebecca…”

“Crowley, I agree I don’t believe she’s behind all this. But in any case, we can tell her what we know and then leave here to get help. We shouldn’t be here alone, trapped. We don’t even know if the spell Anathema left in the Bentley will really work.”

“No, no. We can’t leave,” he said with almost vehement certainty, shaking his head. “Don’t you see? Something here is menacing her. We have to stay. We have to.” He looked at Aziraphale almost pleadingly.

This wasn’t like Crowley at all. Aziraphale was more alarmed at this change in personality than at the notion of being trapped. He would never have insisted on staying where humans had trapped him. What was his motivation to do so? It was as if he had lost his will, and Aziraphale felt real fear pooling in his gut. Whatever was happening to the demon, it was alarming.

“Crowley, dear, look at me.” Crowley’s frightened eyes met his. “Crowley, we have to go. We can get help for Ms. Blackthorne, we can return with our friends, anything, but we need to get out of here. You’re not thinking right. Listen to me. Won’t you take my hand?”

He pulled his chair closer to Crowley’s so that he could reach over to him. To his relief, Crowley grasped his hand wordlessly. Aziraphale began rubbing his thumb over his hand soothingly. It seemed to bring the demon back to himself a little. He looked at Aziraphale and blinked behind his glasses. 

“Angel…” He would have said more, but just then Rebecca appeared with a tray.

She glanced at their hands, their body language as they leaned toward one another, and then their faces, and she must have read something there.

“Here you go,” she said, smiling as she put the tray down. “Tea and sherry.” She let them pour themselves their drinks as she settled and then asked, “I hope I’m not being too forward, but, well—are the two of you _together_?”

To Aziraphale’s great relief, Crowley didn’t hesitate. He smiled genuinely for the first time in awhile and answered, “Yes, in fact, we are.”

Aziraphale beamed, joy temporarily replacing fear. They were together, as a couple. Officially. It had happened quickly, not counting the 6,000 years of denying their feelings for each other.

“Oh—oh, that’s lovely,” she smiled gracefully. Was that disappointment in her eyes?

Aziraphale had a hunch. He debated for a moment, then forged ahead. “Miss Blackthorne, is it possible that you inherited some form of magic from your family? That it runs in the blood, so to speak? I realize your late aunt and uncle practiced black magic, but magic powers in themselves are neutral. One can use them for darkness or for light. I ask because—well, I did notice you touching Mr. Crowley’s hand several times and it seemed to affect him in unusual ways.”

“Angel, what are you doing? You’re embarrassing me,” Crowley muttered. 

Rebecca blushed furiously. “There have been times when I’ve—well, wanted something and it comes to me a little too easily. I’m also able to calm beasts. One time when I was a child, I’d gotten too close to an aggressive dog and it growled at me, but I managed to pat it on the head, and it calmed down right away and licking my hand. And later, in high school there was a boy—well, I won’t bore you with my teenage love life. I’m so sorry if my careless bit of magic affected you, Mr. Crowley. It’s something I’ve never really learned to control. I suppose I found—well, _find_ you attractive. I didn’t know what I was doing.”

“It’s nothing,” said Crowley, his mouth turned up in a lopsided smile directed at Aziraphale. “Feeling a bit better, angel?”

It was Aziraphale’s turn to blush. He hadn’t wanted to advertise his jealousy. “Really, my dear,” was all he could think to say. He felt his face flush deeply. “I suppose I can’t blame you for finding my partner attractive.” This elicited an embarrassed laugh from Crowley.

Some of the tension was broken.

They told Rebecca about Aziraphale’s being attacked in the bookshop, and the lost book of the Lemegeton stolen. Crowley began to tell her about the car chase, but Aziraphale jumped in before Crowley could say where they had been headed. Something still told the angel to be prudent in what they shared. He did not want to give Anathema away.

Crowley refilled his sherry glass and Aziraphale poured a bit more tea.

“That does bring me to a point, Ms. Blackthorne. You see, the car parked on the side of the house is the exact same color and model as the car that chased us. To whom does it belong, if I may ask?”

“Oh, that belongs to Julian Monaghan. He’s Mr. and Mrs. Monaghan’s son. He’s visiting them for a few days. Although actually the Monaghans all left for a little holiday,” she explained. “It was rather sudden. Though if you ask me, she got spooked and decided to leave.”

“She did seem a bit frightened,” said Aziraphale.

“Yes, but it’s odd. She didn’t seem to mention anything to us about going away,” added Crowley. Aziraphale noticed the demon was perspiring. It was getting rather hot in the room.

“Mrs. Monaghan spoke to you?” Rebecca asked.

“Well, just briefly while she was bringing us a tea tray,” said Crowley. “She mentioned the wailing noises you’d described to us and said something odd about your uncle Silas never having left.”

“She said that, did she?” Rebecca asked with raised eyebrows. “What else have the two of you been up to?”

Aziraphale told both of them the most disturbing discovery, that he had seen her uncle Silas in the bookshop two days ago, he was sure of it. She paled.

“That’s impossible,” she said. “He can’t be alive. And if he is, why would he fake his death and then pretend to haunt me? And why would he want a book about demon summoning and magic spells?”

“I agree, none of it seems to make sense,” said Crowley. Especially, he thought, since he was feeling very fuzzy headed right now. How much sherry had he drunk? He set down his glass, his head aching oddly. He looked over at Aziraphale and noticed beads of sweat appearing on the angel’s face. But he’d been drinking tea, not sherry. Was it just unusually stuffy in here?

He and Aziraphale pressed on and told Rebecca about the sigils they found under the rugs.

“We’re concerned that Silas—or whoever is trying to frighten you—is using those sigils for some other purpose. He or they obviously believe they can summon demons,” said Aziraphale, loosening his bow tie and collar. He felt as if the air were closing in around him.

“Summon demons?” repeated Rebecca. “Goodness.”

Aziraphale suddenly had a mad urge to get fresh air. But to go outside…what was it? 

He was having trouble thinking about the problem with _outside_. 

Ah, the drawbridge, that was it.

He wiped his perspiring face with his napkin. It was suddenly very warm in this room and he actually felt a bit sick. Crowley was obviously not feeling well either. He was swaying in his chair.

“Ms. Blackthorne, is it possible to lower the drawbridge?” He badly wanted out, to breathe…

“Possible, yes,” said Rebecca. “But I’m afraid that’s out of the question, gentlemen.”

Aziraphale and Crowley both looked at her, stunned.

“Out of the question? But why?” The angel asked. 

He was acutely aware of a greyness creeping into the perimeter of his vision. 

“Well,” she began. She smiled and there was something in her smile that chilled him. As if she were enjoying some private little joke. “What would be the point?”

“Point?” said Crowley. He felt dizzy and clutched the table for support. What in Someone’s name was happening? 

He could see Aziraphale was beginning to slump over the table, and the room was tilting badly. 

“Yes, what would be the point in lowering the drawbridge?” said Rebecca. “After all, it would break the circle and allow you two to escape. And we went to such great lengths to get you here.”

Ah, yes. Of course. The angel had been right about her after all. Something in the drinks.

The dizziness finally overcame Crowley and the floor rushed up to meet him. 

He dimly heard someone speaking. 

“I’m sure you gentlemen understand.” A woman’s voice. Rebecca. Then footsteps.

“It took you long enough. Having a tea party with them?” It was the voice of an older man.

Just as darkness began to claim him, he felt himself being dragged along the floor. His vision was too blurry to see who it was. He tried to speak, but all that came out was a moan before unconsciousness overcame him.

Crowley woke suddenly, all at once, to find himself lying on a hard and cold surface. The last thing he remembered was being outside, then a scream—then it all came back to him. He’d been talking with the angel and Rebecca in the parlor. They’d been drinking and then…there had been something in the drinks. The large room was dimly lit, but he could see he was lying inside a huge circle that had been carved into the floor. His own sigil, his demonic signature intertwined with the images of a serpent, was underneath him. He tried to at least rise up to a sitting position, but a wave of nausea and a crashing headache prevented it for now. He looked past the circle to see lines having been carved connecting his seal to other circles in the floor. One of them contained the angel.

Aziraphale woke with a groan, confused. He’d been unconscious, but he was slumped against a very uncomfortable round object. Then he realized he was tied—chained, rather—to a post. He had no idea how he’d gotten there. 

“Angel, you’re awake. Are you all right?”

Crowley had managed to sit. Under him peeked out a a design—a sigil, Aziraphale realized. He couldn’t make it all out, but he saw what resembled the head of a snake peeking from a tree, and he realized in horror that it must be Crowley’s sigil. Lines like spokes radiated out from it, and as he looked around the room, he could see the spokes connecting to other circles. Something in his brain told him to look down…

He himself sat in the center of a circle of small stones—he smelled the sulfur just as he realized it was brimstone. They began to glow, and as he reached a foot out towards the edge experimentally, the stones glowed stronger.

As his foot strained to reach the edge, small flames shot up from the brimstones. And this was no ordinary fire, he realized with dread. He looked across the room and saw Crowley struggling to rise as their eyes met in mutual fear.

The demon was trapped in his sigil and seal.

And Aziraphale was trapped in a ring of Hellfire.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so things are looking grim but I swear I would never give these two an unhappy ending! Fair warning, though, the next chapter will be whumpy.
> 
> As always, if you like it, do leave a comment. They are appreciated!


	10. The Basement

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, so sorry it took awhile to update. Holidays, work, and a nasty cold.

Jasmine Cottage

The sun was almost setting at Jasmine Cottage in Tadfield when a black vintage Bentley charged up Anathema’s driveway at an impossible speed. She sat at the table in her kitchen nook watching the car hurtle up the driveway then stood in alarm, convinced it would continue and crash right through the house. Miraculously, however, it stopped just at the end of the driveway. The horn blared insistently, three short honks followed by three long ones and then three short again. 

So, apparently the Bentley knew Morse code. 

Anathema’s stomach lurched with dread. She went outside but already knew there would be no driver behind the wheel. They had only been gone a matter of hours, she thought. Dammit, she knew this was all wrong. It certainly hadn’t taken them long to get into serious enough trouble to activate the charm in the Bentley’s glove compartment. And the car probably knew they were in trouble before they did. Obviously they had walked right into a trap, and a supernatural one at that.

“Shit. Shit, shit, _shit_,” she paced around the car and ran her hands nervously through her hair as she tended to do when she was upset. Then, she patted the car on the hood. “Good girl,” she said. “You did a great job. Why don’t you rest just a little. We’re going to rescue them and you’ll help us again, okay? I promise we won’t be long.”

She swore the car purred at her before shutting its engine off.

She pulled her phone out of her pocket and called Adam. This time he picked up the phone himself rather than one of his parents. He’d obviously been ready for the call, and he was over at the cottage within half an hour. 

He’d grown quite a bit over the past year, but he still had those eyes that were at once childlike yet very old, as if he knew things far beyond a child’s (or typical adult’s) comprehension.

“Got into trouble already, have they? I told my mum and dad I was staying over at Pepper’s,” he said. “And Pepper swore she’d cover for me.”

“Good thinking,” said Anathema. “Though I feel more than a little irresponsible dragging a 12-year-old into danger while essentially lying to his parents. Even if that 12-year-old is a superpowered being.” 

She really was conflicted. Former Antichrist or no, he was a child and she was putting dragging him into a situation with unknown dangers—dangers serious enough that an angel and a demon were in jeopardy and in need of help. She just hoped Adam still had enough of his powers for whatever they needed to do next. 

“I should tell you that I do still have my powers,” he said as if reading her mind, “but there’s one thing…” he trailed off, wondering how to explain it.

_Oh no_, she thought.

“It’s not bad,” he continued. “But it’s like—how do I explain it? It’s like a tank of petrol in a car. The fuel works ‘til it’s out. In the case of me and my powers, I know this is my last tank. The more I use the faster it’ll go. But I should be able to gauge it.”

“Oh, Adam, I didn’t know. If this is your last bit of magic—do you still want to go through with this? I can’t even predict exactly what’s happening or what we’re going to do. Other than charge to the rescue, I mean. And you are, no offense, still a kid. If something happened to you—maybe I should just go it alone.”

Adam looked determined. “I’m not letting those two get hurt or killed while I sit at home watching cartoons, not while I’ve still got powers. Now then, what’s the plan?”

Blackthorne Manor

Whatever had been put in their drinks left Crowley too weak to focus, let alone stand at first. He didn’t know how long he sat on the cold floor trying to will away the dizziness, then try to rise from sitting to standing. Finally after several attempts, Crowley managed to shakily stand up to get a better look at their surroundings. 

They were imprisoned in a large, dark room which had to be the basement. The dim lighting from the bulbs which hung from the ceiling beams made it difficult to see clearly, but there were wooden stairs leading down to the opposite far corner from where Crowley sat. The floor was stone, yet obviously soft enough to allow for the complex sigils and seals to be carved into it. The walls were also stone, and the ceiling was open beamed. Cylindrical support columns were fixed here and there from floor to beams. One of the columns was currently being used to shackle a frightened looking angel within a circle of brimstone. 

Aziraphale’s cumbersome chains wrapped around his waist, in addition to a smaller chain attached to crude cuffs which constrained his hands behind him. They made him look so fragile.

Crowley swore under his breath in anger and frustration. _Stupid, stupid fucking idiot_. He’d walked right into a trap and dragged his angel along with him. For all of Aziraphale’s protestations that he was a good person, Crowley knew himself—that he was a selfish idiot and he was like a wrecking ball, endangering those around him, especially Aziraphale. 

“Angel, are you hurt?” he asked helplessly.

“I’m all right, Crowley. But these restraints—they do sting rather badly when I strain against them.”

“They’re probably Hell-forged. Though how anyone got hold of those, I don’t know. Are you able to call up any magic at all?” Crowley asked, knowing the answer already. Whoever these people were, they knew exactly how to trap both occult and ethereal beings. 

“I’m afraid not,” he answered, his voice shaky. “In addition to burning, these chains and cuffs seem to have neutralized my powers. Crowley, what about you? Are you hurt?”

“No, no I’m all right for now at least.” Leave it to the angel to be bound with burning chains but still ask after Crowley. 

The demon looked more closely at the circle in which he was trapped. He trembled, whether from cold or fear he couldn’t be certain. He hugged himself to stop the shaking. 

Besides his own sigil and containment spells, there were symbols and commands which as far as Crowley could tell translated roughly into “Obey” and “Truth.” Most summoning circles only ensured that the demon is contained and can’t harm the one who summoned him. This was complex magic involving spells that would completely control the demon summoned. Those signs would compel him to obey commands no matter how badly he wouldn’t want to. 

And there was something else.

At first he thought it was a trick of the light, but then he looked closer and he felt his chest tighten, as if his heart was being squeezed in a vice. _Oh Bloody—no, no._

The wide, carved circle which contained him was shimmering where the bare light bulb overhead hit it. Then he saw why. The groove was filled with water. And he was certain it wasn’t just ordinary water. No, somehow he knew without a doubt that it was holy water. The perfect trap. Even if he managed to break the barrier of the circle, he wouldn’t dare cross holy water. One slip and…his fear shot to near panic. _Breathe, breathe_, he told himself. _Panicking won’t help you. Keep it together. Breathe._

“Crowley, what is it?” the angel called. He saw Crowley hugging himself, shaking and hyperventilating as he’d done out by the moat. Had that really just been this afternoon?

“Holy water, angel. The circle is filled with holy water. And these symbols. These symbols… I’ll have to do what they say!” He knew he sounded near hysterical. He tried to take another calming breath.

“Angel, listen to me. I’m not only trapped in here, I’m going to be compelled to do whatever these nutters want me to do. And we don’t even know what that _is_ yet. If it’s something terrible, if they try to make me hurt you, I’m going to do my best to fight it. But if I can’t, and if you find any way to break free, you have to try to stop me. You have to stop me any way you can, angel, understand me?”

“Crowley, what are you suggesting? That I harm you? I’m not going to do that. Besides, I don’t see how I’m going to …”

They fell silent as the basement door opened and two figures descended.

It was Rebecca, followed by Silas. She was still in jeans and a ponytail, looking for all the world like the stereotype of the wholesome “girl next door.” Silas wore the same stern expression as in his portrait and was dressed in a dark suit nearly as outdated as Aziraphale’s clothing. The angel recognized him instantly as the man in his bookshop as well as in the portrait.

The two surveyed the scene, regarding the trapped angel and demon as if they were amusing zoo animals.

“They seem unharmed,” said Silas.

“No thanks to you,” snapped Rebecca. She pointed to Aziraphale. “You nearly killed the angel smashing him over the head like that.”

“Your concern is touching, my dear,” said Aziraphale.

Ignoring him, they moved closer to the center of the room and Rebecca drew nearer to the circle where Crowley was trapped.

Crowley stared at Rebecca. There was something different about her, and not just that the mask of slightly helpless innocence had been replaced by a hardened expression. It was her eyes.

Then he realized what it was. Her eyes were the same ones that had unsettled him so much in the portrait earlier today.

“Lydia Blackthorne,” said Crowley.

“In the flesh.” Rebecca/Lydia mock curtsied. “Well, technically in my niece Rebecca’s flesh.”

She and Silas looked at each other, smiling, then they kissed. The pseudo-incestuous display between the old man and the woman in his niece’s body was hard to watch.

Crowley needed to buy time, and they needed to know what Silas and Rebecca/Lydia were planning. He’d watched movies in which heroes like James Bond would engage the villain in banter in order to stall. He found that in real life also, bad guys tended to enjoy impressing others with their ingenious plans. 

“So tell me, was it you or was it Rebecca who hired me? And why go through the pretense of hiring me as a detective, anyway? This whole time, you could have just summoned me. You obviously have the book with my sigil, so why go through this elaborate scheme?” Crowley asked.

“Ah, because this way we got two for the price of one,” answered Silas. “Your sweet angel here will be most useful. We don’t want a repeat of what happened the last time we summoned a demon.”

“I take it that was over sixty years ago,” said Crowley.

“Indeed. We summoned Hastur, Duke of Hell. His sigil is still on the floor.” Silas pointed to another circle, in one of the other corners. “But we were young and foolish. We didn’t know what to demand or how to guard against a demon’s trickery. He gave Lydia everlasting youth, but he neglected to give her immunity from disease. She died from a malignant tumor less than a year after. And I made the mistake of asking for eternal life but neglected to spell out the terms, including youth. And so I continue to age. I aged as Lydia’s soul spent the last six decades trapped in Hell.” 

“Well, well,” smirked Crowley. “You were well and truly monkey-pawed, weren’t you?” He wouldn’t have thought Hastur would have the brains for that kind of trickery. Much as he despised him, he had to admire him for outmaneuvering these two.

Unfortunately, his amusement infuriated Rebecca/Lydia.

She stalked over to Crowley to stand just outside the circle.

“Let’s see if those obedience sigils work. Stand at attention,” she commanded. 

Her voice seemed to reverberate. In fact, it washed over Crowley like waves of sound, made his body almost tingle. It was soothing, actually. How could he _not_ want to do whatever the voice said? He had to. He found himself standing taller, his arms stretched out at his sides. A part of his brain persuaded him to try to move, but he couldn’t.

Rebecca entered the circle where Crowley stood, stepping over the circular trough of holy water. The demon’s arms remained unnaturally stiff as he stood like a soldier, unable to move his arms or legs. 

She lifted her hand and slapped the demon across the face, hard enough to make his eyes water. His sunglasses, which miraculously had stayed on up until now, went flying and clattered to the floor. 

“Look at me, demon,” she commanded, gripping his chin and turning his head to face her. He opened his eyes to glare at her. She laughed in delight at the sight of them.

“Oh, wonderful,” she said. “Yes, there it is. Look at those eyes. The famous Serpent of Eden. He’ll give me just what I want.” She leaned closer. “I wonder if your tongue is forked,” she breathed near his ear. He shuddered with revulsion as she traced a finger slowly over his snake tattoo. 

“You’re not my type,” he said trying for bravado. 

She responded by circling both hands around his neck and slowly squeezing. As he struggled for air, she stared at his face, studying his reaction as if she had trapped a fascinating small animal she was torturing.

She watched impassively as he began making frantic gurgling sounds and his eyes widened in panic. He couldn’t even move his arms to try to pry her hands away. Some part of his brain knew he wouldn’t discorporate from lack of oxygen but his body didn’t seem to understand. Black dots began to form in his field of vision. 

He could dimly hear Aziraphale shouting, pleading…

“Lydia!” Silas barked. “Are you going to _play_ with it or are we going to get to work?”

The pressure on Crowley’s neck abruptly vanished. He gasped, coughing then taking in huge gulps of air, finally able to move again.

“Oh, very well. But you’re getting to be a spoil sport in your old age. I enjoy playing with him.” She shot Silas a contemptuous look as she stepped back outside the circle. “And may I remind you, you needn’t be so impatient. You’re not the one who was trapped in Hell for over half a century. There were worse things done to me there than a bit of choking play.”

“And h-how, how did you get out of Hell?” Crowley managed, recovering his voice. _Engage her in villainsplaining. Anything to delay whatever it is they planned to make him do_. “Why didn’t old Silas here come to your rescue and summon Hastur again? Why wait sixty years?”

“Apparently bargains with demons are _extremely_ binding,” she said angrily. “As Silas said, we were young and foolish. Hastur agreed to give us what we wanted only if we promised not to summon him or another demon. That didn’t stop Silas from trying, but every attempt failed. So instead, in between torture sessions in Hell, I managed to locate him. It wasn’t easy. Hell is vast—as you know, dear demon—with so many rooms and circles that even after decades it was a miracle that I was able to locate one _particular_ demon. Once I did, it was surprisingly easy for me to strike another deal. He gave me freedom by allowing me to inhabit the body of another. He even gave me brimstone and a little information about a certain angel and demon who enjoy working together.”

Crowley’s eyes widened. He was fascinated in spite of his fear.

“Why would Hastur willingly—” Ah. Well. He knew the answer to that one. Hastur hated him, especially after he’d used holy water to reduce Ligur to a puddle of goo.

“Never mind,” he said.

“Yes,” she smiled. “He was quite eager that I should snare you. Gave me tips on how to keep you in line, in fact. And the most delicious part was your angel actually owning the missing volume of sigils that we needed. You see, it was fate.”

“But just a moment. You _murdered_ your own niece to take over her body?” Aziraphale asked in horror.

“Good Heavens, no!” said Rebecca in mock horror. “I didn’t murder her. She’s still in here with me, just as a sort of—well, back seat passenger I suppose.”

Aziraphale was stunned into silence at the horror of the thought of the poor young woman trapped in her own body but not in control of it. And if they did anything to harm Lydia, they would be harming Rebecca as well.

“Speaking of back seats and such, that reminds me,” said Crowley, “I take it that was you and not the Monaghan’s son following us in the red Bentley?”

“Yes, I’m afraid the Monaghans don’t have a son. By the way, they’ve been, shall we say, permanently let go. Mrs. Monaghan was getting a bit nosy. You know, I did rather underestimate your driving skills,” she said. “I needed to know who you were trying to see. I don’t like loose ends. You know you have to answer me, demon,” she continued. “I want to know what you were up to and who you saw. Just where were you—”

An agonized cry punctuated her mid-sentence as they all turned to see Aziraphale, who had obviously tried to wrench free of his cuffs in a desperate attempt. His hands were raw and scorched.

“Angel!” shouted Crowley.

Aziraphale shot Crowley a meaningful glance.

Silas snarled and strode over to Aziraphale, then stepped over the brimstone to enter the circle where the angel was trapped. He kicked him savagely in the gut. Aziraphale grunted, then grimaced in pain.

_Angel, you idiot_. Crowley winced. He knew immediately what Aziraphale had done. He’d hurt himself as a distraction to stop Rebecca from compelling Crowley to tell her about their visit to Anathema. They couldn’t betray her. The witch was their last chance.

Perhaps Silas had guessed the same, because now he stood over Aziraphale, his face set in a look of pure fury. He plucked a small knife from his robe and hunkered down next to the angel, who tried to pull back instinctively but in vain. Then Silas did something bizarre. He pulled up his left sleeve, then without flinching he dragged the tip of the knife over the inside of his own arm, leaving a bright red wound. Only then did he turn to Aziraphale. He wiped the knife on his robe and offered him a chilling little smile. 

“Don’t worry, little angel. This won’t hurt much.” He used the knife to cut and then tear into the sleeve of the angel’s blazer and shirt. His arm was now exposed.

“Leave him alone!” screamed Crowley. “_Leave him the fuck alone!_” Instinctively, desperately, he lunged at the barrier and was thrown back to the center with force.

“_Hush_,” commanded Rebecca, barely glancing at him as she watched Silas eagerly, and when Crowley opened his mouth to scream again his throat constricted. 

All he could do was watch silently and helplessly as Silas advanced on the angel with the knife. To his credit, Aziraphale didn’t beg. He barely flinched as the knife came down, Silas cutting a clean line into his arm with the tip of the blade.

As blood seeped from the angel’s wound, Silas turned the knife so that his blood coated it. He stepped out of the circle, and then swiped the bloody knife over the cut he had made in his own arm. 

After a few moments he wiped his arm with a handkerchief—and the cut had miraculously disappeared.

“It worked,” he said triumphantly. “Whether the angel willingly heals us or not, we just need his blood.”

Rebecca clapped with delight. “Well done, darling.”

She turned to Crowley. “You will give Silas his youth, and we will keep your angel here forever as our pet healer.”

Miles away, the vintage black Bentley roared down the highway. Anathema still hadn’t quite gotten comfortable with driving on the left side of the road with the steering wheel on the right side of the car, but thankfully the Bentley was doing most of the work. Adam rode shotgun, as they sped toward Blackthorne Manor with only the vaguest of plans, as they had no idea what they would find when they arrived.


	11. Obedience

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Brace yourself, more whumping in this chapter. But there is hope for our boys!

Crowley was incredulous. They wanted him to essentially turn back time on a human body. Turn the old man young again while they would keep Aziraphale captive to constantly heal them.

“Give Silas his youth? Are you mad? I can’t do that!”

And he truly couldn’t, even if he wanted to. Every demon had certain shared powers. All demons could miracle things up, tempt humans, or change their own forms (since they were not human, after all.) But on an individual level, some demons were especially good at sexual temptations, some demons existed only to possess humans, and some higher-level demons could perform magic that others couldn’t.

Crowley may have been the Original Tempter, and he’d achieved notoriety—he was a player in the bestselling book of all time, after all—but he didn’t have the kind of magic that would reverse aging. Only a Duke or Prince of Hell had the juice to do something like that, and even then, it would be difficult. That’s why Hastur had been so pathetic after returning from his summoning decades ago. He'd been drained.

Yes, Crowley could miracle things up. And he had even managed to stop time briefly in a critical moment to save the world, but to magically reverse aging in a human body? It involved healing, renewing cells, repairing everything from skin to bone, all on a ridiculously complex level.

Hastur had misled their captors into thinking that he, Crowley, could somehow make the old man young again. Hastur had known otherwise, of course, undoubtedly relishing the thought of Crowley and Aziraphale’s capture by a couple of ruthless magicians. _Fucking bastard_.

“I don’t have the powers for it,” Crowley blurted.

Absolutely the wrong thing to say, he realized as soon as he said it. 

Lydia had left his summoning circle and now stood next to Silas. They now regarded him in stunned anger.

“Is it actually disobeying you? It _is_ a demon, isn’t it?” asked Silas.

“Of course, look at the eyes,” the other snapped. “And the sigils and seal are working; he’s obviously trapped. I just need to give it a more direct command.”

“Demon,” Lydia said, “I _command_ you to make Silas young again.”

Crowley was hit with multiple sensations. His brain wanted him to obey. He was overcome with the intense need to do what she said. He felt his powers charging up, readying to do _something_, but he doubled over as every muscle seemed to cramp. He wasn’t able to comply, and his brain and body were essentially fighting each other.

“What the hell is wrong with it?” Silas barked. 

“How should I know?” Lydia snapped back. “It’s supposed to _obey_.”

She faced Crowley; her black eyes filled with fury. Then she smiled, her face softening, and it was chilling.

“Perhaps we just need a little persuasion,” she purred. “Let’s see your wings, demon. I want your wings out _now_.”

_Oh fuck, fuck_. 

He tried to resist. His face contorted in pain as he tried to keep his wings from unfurling. They were the most vulnerable part of him. But even as his brain tried to control his body, he could feel the muscles in his shoulders and back straining, twitching as they tried to obey. 

Finally, it was no use. He couldn’t hold it any longer. He felt his shoulder blades flex, releasing his jet-black wings with a soft whoosh. He winced as the tips hit the invisible barrier of the circle. Instantly he folded the wings as close to himself as he could.

“Now don’t move,” breathed Rebecca/Lydia as she stepped over the ring of holy water and re-entered the circle. He froze in place. If only she’d forget to order him to be still, he could chance an escape. Every time she entered and left the circle, it was temporarily broken. If he could grab her somehow and shove himself out with her—but it wouldn’t happen this time. 

Once again, he was frozen, locked in place as she entered and walked slowly around him until she was behind him. 

_Not the wings_, he thought, _please please not the wings_.

Aziraphale was screaming at her to stop, leave him alone. Crowley could hear the anguish in the angel’s voice but couldn’t turn his head to see what was happening. 

_Be quiet, angel, for Satan’s sake, _he thought. He was going to get himself hurt. 

As if on cue, Silas stalked over to the angel once more, this time smashing his fist into the left side of the angel’s face, leaving a small cut where his ring made contact. “Shut it!” he snarled.

Crowley heard the blow. The screams stopped. 

The demon felt pure fury bubbling up inside him, pushing through his own fear. If he ever escaped this circle, he would tear the old man apart.

Then Lydia—Crowley could no longer think of her as Rebecca, not with those cold black eyes revealing her true nature—began running her fingers over his wings. He shuddered, in part from revulsion but also because an angel or demon’s wings were highly sensitive, and touching them was a very personal gesture, meant for grooming or intimacy. Having his wings stroked sensually by Lydia felt like an invasion. The urge to knock her back with the full force of his wing was tremendous, but of course his frozen body didn’t obey.

“So soft,” she breathed, stretching his left wing out just a bit and stroking the glossy black feathers. Her movements were gentle—until she suddenly grasped one of Crowley’s primary feathers tight in her fist. The primaries were the largest of his flight feathers, the ones he could least spare and that would hurt the most to be plucked out.

She tugged on it teasingly, giving it a few little pulls so that he knew what was going to happen.

“You don’t need to do this,” he tried to reason. “There’s no use—”

She pulled it out with a single vicious yank, ripping it from the skin attached to the metacarpal bone. He cried out in pain, his eyes watering despite himself—it was similar to a human having a handful of hair pulled out.

She brushed her fingers along the glossy black feather, then held it up to his face. The shaft was bloody from where it had been yanked out. She ran it along the side of his face, teasingly.

“Now then, you asked how you’re supposed to give Silas his youth,” she said. “The demon Hastur promised me you had the power to do so. So perhaps you just need a bit of motivation?”

_Fucking Hastur_.

She took the feather and stooped down at the edge of the circle, then reached through and dipped the tip of the feather in the holy water which was pooled within the carved circle. She shook off the excess with great show, then approached Crowley with it. 

His heart pounded. Even something like a feather, just slightly dampened with holy water, would hurt him. But what could he do? Lie, to buy some time? Once she discovered he didn’t have the ability to do what they wanted, there would be no reason _not_ to douse him with holy water and be done with him. 

He desperately willed his body to move, but he could do nothing as she sidled up to him, holding his feather up and twirling it playfully.

“Are you _quite_ certain you can’t restore Silas’ youth?” she asked.

She slowly unbuttoned his shirt with her free hand, all the way down to his waist. Then she opened the shirt enough to expose most of his chest. She caressed him with her left hand a little while and looked up at him almost seductively. Then, she took the feather and very lightly brushed a line down the center of his chest. She drew it down with agonizing slowness. It would have tickled had he been a human.

It was excruciating.

It was as if she had slowly opened him up with a red-hot poker. He willed himself not to cry out, but he heard himself screaming anyway.

His breath came in gasps as she pulled the feather away at last. He was drenched in sweat from the stress and pain, and he wondered what the damage looked like.

She then took the feather and twirled it around.

“A keepsake,” she said with a little smile, as if they’d just shared a fond moment together.

“T-touching,” he gasped. He felt as if his chest were on fire. He took a few more gulps of air. “But I still can’t make anyone younger.”

Her face once again twisted into an expression of fury. 

“I tried to be reasonable with you, demon. Just remember that.”

She exited the circle and went to stand by Silas.

“Start in on the angel, darling,” she said.

The old man scoffed. “What will the demon care if I scuff up an angel?”

“I told you,” she said, “They’re in love.” She said it mockingly, and the old man snorted. 

“Ridiculous,” he said. “Unnatural. But you may be right. Demon, you may move again. I wouldn’t want you to miss anything.”

Crowley glanced down at his torso. He saw an ugly line of scorched flesh running down his middle, some of it bubbling. Now that he could turn his head, Crowley looked at Aziraphale. Even in the dim lighting, Crowley’s serpentine eyes could see perfectly well the state that the angel was in. There were scorch marks on his hands from when he had tried to wrestle his way free as a distraction. There was a line of dried blood on one arm where Silas had cut him, and his left cheek just under his eye was bloody and puffing up from where Silas had hit him. He didn’t know how much more “scuffing up” Aziraphale could take.

Silas smiled broadly at Lydia. “I have an idea.” He picked up a metal pipe from the ground and approached Aziraphale once again. This time, he paused at the brimstone circle that surrounded the angel and muttered something while waving his hand over it. It was obviously an incantation, because flames shot up from the brimstone. Silas put one end of the metal pipe into the fire and kept it there until when he pulled it out the end glowed red hot. Then he muttered something else to make the flames go out and he stepped into the circle toward the angel.

Aziraphale and Crowley both understood immediately what he was about to do.

“_No! No, you can’t!_” screamed Crowley. Lydia turned to him and grinned. 

“Really, y-you don’t have to do this,” Aziraphale stammered. He cringed instinctively but had no place to go, chained to the post.

“I know,” Silas replied.

Lydia stood by watching, an eager expression on her face.

“_NO!_” screamed Crowley again, beating on the barrier of the seal, but the pair ignored him. 

Silas took the end of the metal rod, the end still faintly glowing, and pressed it into his arm right over the still-fresh knife wound.

The angel screamed.

Crowley fought down panic as he tried to think of something. He had to stop them. He couldn’t let this continue; they’d torture him near discorporation. He had to tell them what they wanted to hear. But they’d find out instantly that he lied—_unless_… 

He couldn’t make Silas younger, but he could miracle an _illusion_ of youth. They would leave Aziraphale alone, at least until they discovered the ruse. Hopefully that would take some time. It was stalling, at best, but it was something. He’d just have to hope that he could persuade them not to dissolve him with holy water once he’d done it.

“I can do it!” he yelled. “I can make him younger, just stop—just leave him alone!”

“Crowley, no. What are you…” Aziraphale said quietly, nearly sobbing with pain.

_Trust me_, Crowley tried to convey with his look. He nearly cried at seeing his angel in agony.

Still, to his great relief, Lydia and Silas stepped away from Aziraphale and walked toward Crowley.

“You see,” said Silas, “It _can_ be reasonable. Let’s begin.”

After what seemed like an eternity, even with the Bentley travelling at near-impossible speeds, they approached the road leading up to Blackthorne Manor. The Bentley slowed as they began up the narrow road to the house. The dark stone structure loomed ahead.

“It looks like every haunted house I’ve ever seen in movies,” commented Anathema.

Adam remained silent until they drew much nearer, about halfway up the road to the house.

“Can you feel it?” he asked. “The fear, I mean.”

“No,” Anathema admitted. “Just my own sense of dread.”

Finally, they pulled up to the end of the road and saw the dark stone mansion in front of them.

“I can see the aura,” said Anathema.

Adam frowned. “Houses can have auras?”

“It isn’t just the structure itself,” explained Anathema. “Buildings become imbued with the essence of the people that live there. You walk into a church and feel peace and hope. You walk into a funeral home and feel heavy and silent. The feelings aren’t a product of the function of the place. They’re like the residue of all the emotions and energy that people have left behind.

“So, what’s the aura of this place like?” asked Adam.

“Dark. Murky. I suppose what you’d expect.”

“I can feel it. It feels like—I dunno, I suppose like it’s diseased. Almost like the house has cancer or something, does that sound mad?”

“Not at all,” said Anathema. “And our demon and angel are trapped in there. Adam, you’re still cool with this? Like I said before, I’m asking a lot of you. We don’t even have a plan because we’re not even sure what we’re facing.”

Adam’s face was grim. “They’re like godfathers to me, or uncles. We all saved the world together. There’s no way I’m not charging in there with you.”

There was just one problem, namely the very wide, deep and currently drawbridge-less moat in front of them.


	12. The Powers that Be

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter took awhile, but thanks so much for being patient!

Lydia narrowed her eyes at Crowley. “So you weren’t able to restore my husband’s youth when I commanded it, but now you can?”

Crowley’s heart hammered in his chest. _Shit_, she was suspicious. He had to answer convincingly. Thank Satan she hadn’t commanded him to answer truthfully.

“I—that is, I tried. But I’m not as strong as Hastur. I can’t just snap my fingers. Just give me a moment. Don’t hurt the angel again, I can do it.”

“Very well,” said Silas. “But if you fail, he dies. And as for you…” He glanced meaningfully at the ringed pool of holy water.

Crowley fought down his fear. Not since helping to thwart the Apocalypse had he wished so much that he could pray to someone who’d listen. He had to make the old man think he’d been made young again. If the illusion failed…

He felt the weight of Silas’s eyes on him as the old man stalked over, crossing the barrier into the circle to stand squarely in front of the demon. The low light from the bare bulb hanging overhead illuminated his face eerily. 

The demon fought the mad urge to punch that face in, knowing the sigils wouldn’t allow him to harm his captors—he’d end up crumpled in a ball of pain and his angel would suffer their wrath. He forced his face into a neutral expression of concentration.

If he was going to make Lydia and Silas think he was actually reversing the aging process, he’d have to make it seem realistic. At least he could miracle the external features to look younger—smooth out wrinkled skin, change the hair from gray to black. 

But inside, the organs and cells would still be old. And he wouldn’t be able to duplicate the _feeling_ Silas would have if he were actually younger. Things such as arthritic aches and creaky knees would not go away. So, he would compensate by giving the old bastard a little hit of euphoria. He’d feel elated, and that should mask the fact that he was still an old man internally.

He wondered how theatrical he should make this. He and the angel each used small gestures when they performed miracles. They would snap their fingers or wave a hand. There was no reason, really, to do either. The magic was there one way or the other. But it was a way for them to focus and channel the power physically through their corporations.

He began with a dramatic flourish, sweeping his hands in front the old man’s face and frowning in mock concentration.

The deep grooves in his forehead and around his mouth smoothed, the skin around the chin, neck and jaw tightened. Then the smaller wrinkles smoothed out. Next were the hands since they were the other visible part of his body. He miracled his hair darker as he did all this. 

Lastly, he imbued the old man with a jolt of mild euphoria, just enough to give him the illusion of youthful vigor.

“Silas?” Lydia breathed. 

In the place of the sour-faced old man, there now stood what appeared to be a young, dark haired man with as cruel an expression as his wife’s. He was the image of the younger Silas from the portrait in the library. Black hair, flinty eyes and a cold smile.

He stepped out to stand by Lydia, who reached her hand to touch his now smooth face. 

“There you are, just as I remember sixty years ago,” she said. “It’s wonderful.”

“Lydia, dear. You bargained your way of Hell itself and captured a demon to bring my youth back. I am in awe.” 

They embraced and kissed deeply. 

Crowley fought down the urge to gag, then prayed there would be nothing in that kiss to tip off Lydia that Silas was still as old and dried up as he’d been just minutes earlier.

He panicked as they both turned to look at him, wondering if they could have read his thoughts. 

“It was surprisingly easy to trap the demon, darling. And the angel, too. Once I realized the demon was actually _playing detective_, of all things—”

Crowley cringed. She had touched a sore spot. He’d been not only an idiot, but an idiot who’d endangered his best friend and the love of his life.

His thoughts must have shown in his expression because she laughed heartily at that.

“—all I had to do was bat my eyes and touch him occasionally with an attraction spell. Even if he came to his senses, he’d be inexplicably compelled to help me. And best of all, apparently wherever he goes, his _angel_ follows.” 

Crowley threw a glance at Aziraphale, who was slumped over miserably in his ring of brimstone, but thankfully silent. He wanted to keep the pair’s attention away from his angel.

“You got what you wanted,” Crowley said. “Now you can release us.”

Silas sneered. “Is that what you think?”

“Test your powers, dear,” suggested Lydia, “now that you have your old vigor back.”

Before Crowley had time to even register it, Silas reached a hand out toward him, toward his injured wing.

“_Flecto_,” he snarled. “_Retorqeo_.” He twisted his hand.

Crowley screamed. 

His wing, already sore from the ripping out of his feather, was being twisted, wrenched. He felt something snap, and a lightning bolt of pain shot through his wing to his shoulder. 

Then, mercifully, the magician lowered his hand.

The bastard had twisted his wing until it now hung limply at his side. It was agonizing. He hated the tears now running down his face, but he couldn’t help it. The pain was intense, and the weight of the injured wing pulled heavily on his shoulder. Everything throbbed.

Lydia mockingly pushed her lower lip out. “Poor little demon—Silas, you made him cry.”

Silas laughed and pulled her into an embrace. He leered at her. “Let’s see how our young bodies work together, my dear. I feel…energized.”

He addressed Crowley. “We’ll be back, demon. And then we’ll decide if there’s any further use for you.”

He squeezed Lydia’s rear and then smacked it. She giggled in delight and they left to ascend the basement stairs, presumably to have a shag in their new bodies. She threw a glance back at Crowley and gave him a wink.

Crowley slumped, then turned to look at Aziraphale. Every movement hurt, his chest ablaze from the holy water and his entire left side ached from his dislocated wing, which now dragged sadly on the floor.

“Angel? Angel look at me,” he called softly. Aziraphale looked up at him, miserably.

“Oh, Crowley. Look what they’ve done to you.”   
Crowley wondered if the angel realized how awful _he_ looked.

“It’ll be all right, angel,” he said, trying to convince himself as well as Aziraphale. “I don’t know how, but we’ll be all right. I love you so much.”

“I love you too, my dear. I’m sorry it took so long to say it, I just—”

“You don’t need to say anything more, angel. We’re saying it now.”

* * * * * 

Outside, across the moat, Adam and Anathema regarded the huge, heavy drawbridge that they would have to lower with magic. Anathema sensed their time was short if they wanted to rescue their friends.

“Let me help you, Adam,” said Anathema. “We don’t know how much power we’re going to need you to use once we’re inside. I don’t have the kind of power you do, but I’ve been really working on my craft since our brush with Armageddon. I’ve been developing my telekinetic abilities, and I should be able to help move the drawbridge. It’ll save you a little of your own powers, at any rate.”

Since she was no longer a full time descendent of Agnes Nutter, Anathema had worked instead on honing her own skills as a witch. Her powers were developing nicely; she’d focused on channeling her energy and using incantations. 

“_Descendum_,” she tried intoning, her hands outstretched and pointing to the drawbridge. She focused all her concentration on the massive object, repeating the command. “_Descendum, descendum_…”

The enormous chains rattled, the drawbridge shook as it began to come free and lower down. It was working! She kept it up, but after a full minute of this effort, Anathema began to shake from the strain. She just didn’t have the raw power to move such a massive object on her own.

“I’m sorry. I can’t quite…You’re going to have to jump in now, Adam.”

He nodded, focusing his mind and his gaze on the long drawbridge. He concentrated on moving it, amping up his power incrementally. He didn’t want to use too much before they entered the mansion, knowing he’d need whatever he had once inside. 

At last, the drawbridge groaned as it pulled away and lowered, finally resting on their side of the moat. Quickly, they reentered the Bentley.

The car leapt into action as soon as Anathema touched the steering wheel, crossing the moat over the drawbridge in a mere second. Adam and Anathema jumped out, Anathema pausing to pat the car lovingly on the bonnet. 

“Good girl,” she praised. “You’ve done so much. Wait for us and we’ll bring them out.”

Adam threw her a look.

“What? She has feelings, you know. Don’t roll your eyes at me, kid.”

Adam smiled and shrugged.

They crept in through the front door. They both sensed the oppressive, poisonous atmosphere of the house immediately. 

Anathema felt as though they’d walked into a pea-soup fog of malevolence. The air was thick with it, and Anathema began to feel queasy.

“How did Crowley and Aziraphale not sense the danger as soon as they walked into this house?” she wondered aloud. “They are still here, aren’t they?”

“They’re here,” said Adam. “I can sense them. This way.”

“Someone here has magic powerful enough to mask the bad vibes of this house, enough to fool two supernatural beings,” said Anathema. “Right now, I’m sensing fear, too, and I think it’s coming from them.”

They made their way slowly through the hall, on high alert for any imminent threat. It wasn’t long before they both located the source of the fear, from the angel and demon trapped in the basement.

“They’re scared,” said Adam. “They’re definitely down in the basement. I can feel it. I can sense fear and pain. But we’re not too late.”

“Thank God,” breathed Anathema. “Are you ready?”

The boy nodded, resolutely. “Ready.”

The door leading down to the basement was open and they moved quickly toward it.

“Wait,” Anathema whispered as they prepared to descend the wooden stairs.

She muttered an incantation under her breath. “Just in case anyone _else_ is down there with them…they won’t hear us coming now. Just a little protection spell so they won’t notice us, but it won’t hold too long.”

They descended the stairs, and let their eyes adjust to the dim light.

Both of them stood there in stunned silence at first. 

The angel and demon were each trapped in a circle, both injured. Where Crowley’s shirt had obviously been opened, Anathema could see an angry line of raised, burned flesh which ran down Crowley’s sternum to his navel. His wings were out, though folded, but one was hanging limply at his side, as though it had been broken or dislocated.

Her breath caught as she turned her head to look at Aziraphale. The angel looked as badly hurt as Crowley. He had obviously been beaten, an ugly purple lump under one eye the size of a golf ball. His clothes were torn, and a gash ran down one arm, with what looked like a round burn mark punctuating one end. The tattered remains of his sleeve were scorched. She glanced at Adam, whose face was as set in anger as hers was in shock and sadness.

She realized that she and Adam had been standing halfway down the stair simply staring, the angel and demon not having noticed their presence due to her little protection spell. They descended the steps in a rush.

“Miss Device!”

“Adam!”

“Be careful,” said Crowley, “they could be back any moment.”

“Who?” demanded Anathema. “Who did this to you?”

Crowley gave them the briefest of rundowns on their “client,” a sorceress escaped from Hell and now possessing her own niece’s body. And, of course, her husband, a dark magician who enjoyed torturing angels. 

Crowley emphasized the need to hurry. If their captors were off having resurrection sex after sixty years of abstinence, they probably were not going to take too long.

Adam and Anathema paused for just a moment, unsure where to start. Then as if through some unspoken communication, Adam turned toward Aziraphale while Anathema started towards Crowley, who was nearest her.

But just as they made to free their friends, they were interrupted.  
“Well, my goodness gracious. How did the basement get so crowded all of a sudden?” said a woman’s voice.

Everyone froze for a moment. 

Anathema whirled around. Lydia and Silas had appeared on the steps, undetected until now.

_Shit, forgot to remove that protection spell_, she thought. They hadn’t heard them coming.

For a moment, it was almost as if time had frozen. Adam, Anathema and the two magicians simply regarded each other wordlessly.

“Adam,” murmured Anathema, breaking the silence.

Many things happened at once.

As Silas growled and began to raise his hands, Adam held out both _his _hands much like a traffic cop. He used one hand to hold Silas off. Silas was clearly shocked at a boy with the ability to freeze him in place. Adam’s other hand was aimed at Lydia.

“It’s not right, being two people,” said Adam. “One of you doesn’t belong here.” 

He focused his gaze on Lydia. Her eyes widened in panic as she realized what was Adam was doing. When Adam had separated Aziraphale from Madame Tracy’s body back at the airfield, it had been different. Both parties had been willing. 

But he was quite literally ripping Lydia Blackthorne from Rebecca’s body, and Lydia was resisting.

Rebecca/Lydia screamed, a high-pitched scream of fury and agony as Adam struggled to tear Lydia against her will from Rebecca’s body.

Silas watched dumbstruck, his own magic useless against the powers of the former Antichrist.

As Silas was detained and distracted by Adam, Anathema rushed to Crowley’s circle.

She took a long stride over the ring of holy water—which likely wasn’t much over two feet wide but it had enough to intimidate the demon—and stood next to Crowley. The demon was nervous at the thought of dragging his wing through a barrier of holy water.

“I’m going to take you through with me,” said Anathema. “You can do this. I’m going to focus what powers I can on protecting you from the water.”

“I—I can’t use my wings to help,” Crowley said, miserably.

“I know. Just trust me. You have to try okay?” she asked gently.

He nodded. She had him wrap his good arm and wing around her, and she wrapped her arm around his waist.

“Ready?” she asked.

“It’s now or never.”

They leapt through, Crowley feeling as though he were being dragged through a wall of gelatin. He nearly cleared the holy water. Nearly, because the tip of his left wing dragged and dipped just enough into it to singe the end feathers. He hissed in pain.

Once clear, Anathema supported the demon until he could stand, shakily.

“I’m sorry, Crowley. I lifted the wing up as much as I could.”

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” he said hurriedly, ignoring the searing pain down his chest and the ache of his injured wing.

“I’ve got to get to Aziraphale …. Angel, I’m coming,” the demon called out to him. 

He turned to the angel and began moving toward him when he heard a strangled cry behind him. Crowley turned around to see Silas now facing Anathema, his hand outstretched as he muttered something, probably an incantation. Anathema clawed at her throat. Adam had been using so much power to separate Lydia from Rebecca’s body that he’d forgotten about Silas, letting him slip away.

Anathema struggled, reflexively trying to loosen a physical binding that wasn’t there. Silas was strangling her, Vader style.

Crowley snapped. At that moment, along with Anathema’s struggling for breath, every image of Silas torturing his angel—kicking him, beating him, branding him with the rod heated in Hellfire—came flooding through. 

Crowley channeled his anger until he could feel his demonic essence rising to the surface, fangs and claws elongating. Scales began to shimmer where bare skin had been. His rage overwhelmed his physical pain, and he hissed, readying to strike.

Silas whirled around, forgetting Anathema as his eyes widened in horror at the winged snake/human hybrid before him. Anathema stumbled back, gasping for air. She moved away hurriedly, not wanting to be in the crossfire of the demon’s imminent attack on Silas.

Crowley was nearly feral now, no longer hissing but snarling in anger. But Silas, still energized from the burst of youthful vitality Crowley had given him, outstretched his hands to defend himself.

A ball of energy appeared, barely visible to the naked eye except for a shimmering in the air. Crowley had tensed, ready to spring, but in an instant, Silas attacked—not by hurling the energy ball at Crowley, but by holding it out defensively in front of him like a shield while the other hand flicked subtly behind him at the Crowley’s summoning circle.

With that small movement, he gathered droplets of holy water from the circle and flung them at Crowley.

It wasn’t much, but the tiny splash of water hit Crowley’s outstretched arms, which sizzled and smoked where each drop had landed. 

He howled as it burned through his skin like acid.

For the few moments he was distracted with the pain, Silas hurled the ball of energy at him, knocking him backwards onto the ground. His wings beat instinctively in order to right himself, but his damaged wing threw his balance off. He struggled a moment to get back on his feet, giving Silas just enough time to reach for the ringed pool of holy water again.

Crowley’s torso and arms were on fire from the holy water burns—but like a wounded animal, the pain only stoked Crowley’s fury.

Before Silas had time to launch another attack, the demon lunged. He howled as he hurled into Silas, with just enough presence of mind to knock his target sideways, away from the circle of holy water. 

Crowley snapped his fingers, and in that one motion, gone was the youthful energy he’d given Silas—along with the illusion of youth. 

Silas’ eyes widened in horror as he realized he was a weak old man once again. Crowley had him pinned to the ground. He grinned down horribly at his prey, fangs fully elongated and dripping with venom. 

But the moment before he was about to strike, the old man’s face twisted in agony. His eyes bulged out as he gurgled, his face turning red and then purple. The gurgles ceased as a river of saliva trickled from one side of his mouth. With one final strangled sound, Silas was dead, his eyes still open and the whites almost completely red. 

Crowley’s rage subsided as he looked down with disgust at the dead man. 

All the horrors the old magician had committed, and in the end he’d died of fear.

The demon scrabbled off the corpse and stumbled back, righting himself with some difficulty because of the weight of his wing. He felt himself slowly calming, returning back to normal.

By the time Crowley had returned to his former state, all the pain from his multiple injuries blossomed back again. There were very few parts of his body that didn’t hurt. 

He stood gasping for a moment, exhausted and aching, but he knew there was still Lydia to contend with, and Aziraphale needed to be freed.

But Anathema had taken matters into her own hands. 

While Crowley was engaged in fighting off Silas, and Adam trying to separate Lydia from Rebecca’s body, Anathema had slipped unseen to the brimstone circle to free Aziraphale. She kicked away a segment of the brimstone and worked next on the Hell-forged shackles. 

“I’ve never done something like breaking metal with my powers,” she warned Aziraphale, who looked up at her and smiled through his pain and exhaustion.

“I trust you, my dear.”

Warmed and strengthened by the angel’s words, she closed her eyes and focused on calming herself, summoning strength from the earth and from herself, channeling it into her hands. She opened her eyes, held her hands out toward the restraints and chanted, _“Abscindo, abscindo, vincula dissolvat…”_ She closed her eyes again and imagined them breaking. 

At last, she heard the chains rattling, then a loud snap as the cuffs broke apart and landed on the floor behind the angel. Anathema let out her breath as she opened her eyes, then ran to Aziraphale.

“Let me see your hands.” They were nearly raw and scorched from struggling against the demonic restraints. Anathema took his soft hands in hers and looked up into his tired eyes. “Can you heal yourself.”

“Yes, I think I can now. Thanks to you, my dear.” 

He took one hand and passed it over his opposite wrist, erasing away the terrible scorch marks and healing the skin. Then he repeated the process on the other hand. He rose, a bit stiffly, then directed his gaze to Adam and Lydia.

“I’d best lend our young friend a hand,” he said. 

Glancing quickly toward the opposite side of the basement, Aziraphale could see that Crowley was bent over a prone figure lying on the floor. The angel had watched helplessly as Crowley fought the magician, morphing into his demonic form. Now he saw that Crowley was back into his natural state, no longer scaled and fanged. He clearly did not need the angel’s help—but Adam might.

Adam had been using a great deal of his remaining powers to expel Lydia from Rebecca’s body. The screams and moans continued, punctuated by sorrowful wails. It was unclear whether Rebecca was perhaps fighting back, trying to push Lydia out as Adam used his powers separate them.

As Aziraphale approached, Lydia/Rebecca shrieked one last time and then she collapsed to the ground. 

Adam was spent. Everyone stared at the spot Lydia occupied and where Rebecca now lay.

“She’s alive,” said Aziraphale, bending down to check on her.

“That’s it,” Adam said. “I separated them. Took most of my powers but I did it. You look a lot better, Mr. Aziraphale,” he added, managing a small grin but otherwise looking pale and worn.

“Thank you, my boy,” said Aziraphale. “For everything.”

Crowley had moved away to join the others, and now stood next to the angel, who took a hand and stroked the side of Crowley’s face. “My dear, let me heal you.”

But just then, a low wail once again could be heard, this time seeming to come from everywhere. It rose steadily until it finalized into a woman’s scream—but this was no longer Rebecca’s voice. From the dark corner of the basement where Silas lay, now clearly dead, a dark human-shaped figure appeared. It hovered over Silas, then screamed once more—it was an unearthly shriek filled with anger and grief.

This time, it was Aziraphale who acted. He strode toward the dark, wailing figure in the shadows.

“Angel,” said Crowley. “No, what are you…” But the words died in his mouth. His Angel was taking over.

His wings unfurled, wide and brilliantly white as he strode purposefully toward the wailing shadowy figure. He spoke, intoning commands in Enochian words that reverberated through the room and which only Crowley understood. 

_The angel was sending Lydia back to Hell_. 

Aziraphale was actually _glowing_ with celestial light, his words and the brilliance emanating from his being drowning out the awful shrieks. Light poured everywhere from the angel, and for a moment Crowley worried he was going to bring the house down on top of them. The ancient Enochian words continued to ring out, overpowering the room. Finally, the shrieks died away and the dark howling form—all that had remained of Lydia—was gone. 

A breathless silence fell over the room.

“Finally,” said Crowley, breaking the silence, “those two are where they belong. I hope Beelzebub’s got a warm welcome for them.”

Aziraphale healed Crowley’s wounds as best he could, miracling away most of the damage. His badly injured wing would take more time and care, but the angel was able to take away most of the pain.

He held Crowley in his arms, awkwardly due to the demon’s hurt wing, and stroked his head. Then they kissed and gazed into each other’s eyes until they heard a polite cough from Anathema.

“What do you say we get out of here?” said Crowley.

Aziraphale carried Rebecca, unconscious but alive, outside with them. Once outside the house, the bedraggled group stood in the dark—it was now the middle of the night—until the headlights from the Bentley flashed on, illuminating the group in the beams. The car started, motor purring, as if beckoning them to get in. Crowley carefully climbed into the driver’s seat, Aziraphale joining him on the passenger’s side after situating Rebecca in the back seat between Adam and Anathema.

“We’ll have to take her to a hospital,” said Aziraphale.

“If you drive us to the nearest one, I’ll take her in, Crowley,” offered Anathema. You two should drop Adam back off at home and go get some rest.”

“Uh, look, you guys,” said Crowley awkwardly, “Thanks. I mean, you rescued us.”

“Yes,” added the angel. “My dears, I don’t know if we can ever properly repay you. And Adam, your powers—”

“It’s all right,” Adam said. “They weren’t going to last forever anyway. I put them to the best use I can think of. You two saved me, now I paid it back.”  
Crowley coughed, uncomfortable with all the expressions of gratitude. “Yeah, well, right then…Let’s just get out of here.” 

“Crowley?” said Aziraphale.

The demon looked over at him as he simultaneously put on a fresh pair of sunglasses.

“Yes, angel?”

“I never thought I would say this, but…Go as fast as you like, my dear.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There'll be one more chapter to tie up loose ends and have a peek at what lays ahead for our two boys.


	13. Another New Venture

One Month Later

It was a Sunday morning. Aziraphale woke, eyes still closed against the morning light. He stretched an arm lazily out, expecting it to wrap around his sleeping demon. When his hand landed on nothing but the cold sheets, he frowned and opened his eyes. 

Their roles had apparently reversed today. Usually it was Aziraphale that rose early, or neglected to sleep at all. Before the events surrounding Crowley’s detective venture, Aziraphale never really slept. But now, generally after a night of lovemaking, Aziraphale would find himself drifting off and sleeping through the night. 

Their relationship had rapidly progressed after declaring their love in basement of Blackthorne Manor. The night of their escape, after dropping off Adam, Anathema and Rebecca, he and Crowley had returned to the bookshop together. They’d embraced, cried a bit in each other’s arms with relief and joy, and slept together in the same bed for the first time. Aziraphale had finished healing what he could—his bruised face and most of Crowley’s wing, though his missing feather would have to grow back on its own—and then they’d kissed and fallen asleep spooning, both exhausted from their ordeal. 

Then they’d spent most of the next day together in bed, making love. They were making up for thousands of lost years. They took a break when the angel got peckish, then ended up on the sofa trying out new positions. The shop remained closed, needless to say, for that day and the next, and several days after that. 

Aziraphale had read that human males often slept better after sex. Crowley assured him this was not the reason he’d always been such a fan of sleeping. He’d gotten into the habit ever since the Spanish Inquisition when he’d just needed to shut down awhile and eventually his corporation had got used to it.

They both had occasional nightmares about their ordeal in the basement, of course. Crowley would wake up in a sweat after dreaming of the angel beaten senseless, Hellfire burning around him. Aziraphale dreamed of Crowley’s wings being plucked completely away, one feather at a time as he screamed. Then the one would comfort the other with cuddling and soothing words.

But most of the time they just reveled in their newfound relationship. Crowley stayed at the bookshop most of the time now. He brought a few of his plants over from his Mayfair flat and he’d occasionally pop over there to water the rest of the plants. 

Aziraphale padded sleepily down the stairs to the main floor of the bookshop to find Crowley sitting at the little table with the newspaper and a cup of tea. The demon had apparently already been out and about, as evidenced by the pastry boxes on the counter. 

“Morning, angel,” he grinned as Aziraphale came and planted a kiss on his cheek.

“This is certainly a surprise,” said the angel. “You’re up before me, and reading the newspaper no less.”

“Popped over to my flat to make a phone call to some old friends, then I stopped by that pastry shop you’re so enamored with.”

“Old friends? Crowley, what have you been up to?”

“Nothing, angel. I didn’t want to call Hell from your phone—”

“You _contacted Hell?_ Crowley, are you mad? Why would you possibly do such a thing?” Aziraphale placed a hand over his heart as if he might faint.

“It’s all right, angel. Listen, I might have tipped them off about the recent activities of a certain Duke of Hell. But listen,” he said as Aziraphale plopped down heavily into the chair opposite him at the small breakfast table. 

He poured the angel a cup of tea and handed him a piece of toast to calm his nerves. 

“Listen, there’s an interesting article in the crime section. Nigel Dixon’s body was found. He’d been dead for at least month, probably more. He was found in his own house after neighbors complained of a foul smell, and get this—the paper says that ‘various occult paraphernalia were found near the body.’”

“Wait, who is Nigel Dixon?” Aziraphale frowned. “That name sounds familiar.”

“He was the solicitor who handled old Silas’s estate for Rebecca. Lydia gave us his card, remember?”

Aziraphale nodded, spreading jam on his toast. “Yes, but I can’t imagine why she did, come to think of it.”

“I think it was supposed to be a trap. That article mentions ‘occult paraphernalia,” and I’m guessing they were blessed and cursed items meant to trap us. Kidnapping us that way would be less risky than betting we’d _actually_ drive out to Blackthorne Manor like a couple of idiots. Think about it, angel. It’d be perfectly natural for Rebecca to show up at the solicitor’s office. But instead, it’s _Lydia_, and she terrifies and threatens Dixon into agreeing to help her. This Nigel Dixon was like Lydia’s Renfield.”

“Crowley, I’m impressed. A literary reference!”

Crowley rolled his eyes. “I’ve seen every version of Dracula, angel. I don’t need to bother slogging through the book.”

Aziraphale pursed his lips disapprovingly. “It’s hardly a slog, my dear. It’s a masterpiece of—oh, never mind. I suppose her initial plan failed because we didn’t behave like proper detectives.”

“Yeah, we foiled her plan with my idiocy. You know, the first thing any _real_ detective would have done would have been to contact the solicitor. But naturally the first thing we decided to do was consult a witch. Let’s face it, I’m a shite detective.”

Crowley frowned, jutting out his lower lip. He was peering very intently into his teacup. Aziraphale reached over and put his hand on Crowley’s.

“My dear, you’re brave and brilliant. We may not be the best detective team, but in the end, we did save a young woman from—well, literally a fate worse than death. To be trapped forever in your own body while an evil spirit has control of it…” He shuddered.

“I suppose you’re right,” said Crowley. “Still, it was all because we fell into a trap. And angel, I put you in danger…”

Aziraphale rose from his seat and walked over to Crowley. He bent over and turned his head gently to look at him, then kissed him softly on the mouth.

“We’ve been over this, dear. We’re safe and we’re together,” Aziraphale said. “And a young lady is alive and well thanks to the Crowley Detective Agency, no matter how it came about. We never did do things conventionally, did we, my dear?”

Crowley smiled at that. He could feel the wave of love pouring from the angel, and it _did_ make things all right.

Just then Aziraphale’s old fashioned rotary phone rang. 

“Oh, hello Anathema,” said the angel. 

Anathema had finally persuaded Aziraphale to stop calling her _Miss Device_. “I think we can all be on a first name basis after everything we’ve been through,” she’d pointed out.

He spoke with her for ten minutes or so, and Crowley gave him a quizzical look as the angel hung up the phone with a smile on his face. 

“It seems Rebecca Blackthorne has fully recovered and is now taking on a complete restoration of the mansion," said Aziraphale. "She has very little memory of what happened, and Anathema’s convinced her that those memories were hallucinations or dreams. She managed to convince her medical team that she’d suffered some kind of amnesia after a fall. Now the young lady’s horrid uncle is truly gone, she does actually plan to turn it into a quaint B&B. Oh, and Anathema and Adam would both like to meet with us next weekend again. I suppose it's turned into a sort of fortnightly affair," continued the angel. "I'm so glad the boy is fine even after losing most of his powers. ” 

Aziraphale sat back down across from Crowley to finish his tea and toast. “_And_, we’ll be getting a wedding invitation soon, my dear. She and young Newton have set the date. Isn’t that exciting?”

Crowley watched the angel lick a bit of stray jam off his finger, then suck his fingertip to get the last bit. “Uh, yeah. Yeah, that’s nice, angel,” he said distractedly as he watched. Why must the angel always eat like it was foreplay? 

He squirmed and cleared his throat.

“Well. Yes. Right. Anyhow, would you fancy a drive today, angel? I thought we could take a picnic. I already bought some of your favorite pastries to tempt you.” He waved his hand at the pink boxes.

The angel’s eyes lit up. “Temptation accomplished, as always. What’s the occasion, my dear?”

“No special occasion, just thought a drive to the country would be nice.”

An hour or so later, they were out the door and they made their way to the Bentley.

“Why are you bringing the newspaper along?” asked Aziraphale, glancing at the rolled-up paper in Crowley’s hand.”

“You’ll see.”

They were still on the sidewalk when suddenly Aziraphale stopped in his tracks and stared at the windscreen of the car.

“Crowley, are those bullet holes? I don’t remember being shot at when we were being chased.”

“They’re decals, angel. Pretty realistic, eh? I thought, if I’m not going to be a detective anymore, I can at least look the part. I had them on in the sixties, you know.”

“I hadn’t noticed them then.”

“That’s because you were too busy worrying over me about that thermos and accusing me of going too fast.”

Aziraphale whacked him playfully on the bum.

“Oi!”

They climbed into the Bentley, Aziraphale placing the picnic basket and pastries carefully in the back seat.

Crowley casually tossed the newspaper into the angel’s lap. Aziraphale saw that it was folded to a page in the real estate section, with an item circled in black ink. He looked over at the demon, his blue eyes wide.

Aziraphale read the advertisement out loud.

_“One Bedroom Cottage for Sale: _

_Situated in the South Downs with beautiful views. Charming garden with patio. Ideal location near both shops and the lovely surrounding countryside.”_

Well?” Crowley said, expectantly. “Angel, are you okay?” Aziraphale looked like he might cry. 

“A cottage in South Downs?”

Crowley glanced over at him nervously. Was it too much, too soon?

“Crowley,” said Aziraphale softly. “There’s nothing I would love more than to share a cottage with you.”

And once again, Crowley felt the wave of pure love radiating from his angel, filling the whole car with it—with light, love, and at last a certainty in the demon’s own heart that the angel was really _his_ angel, at last.

* * *

_Memorandum_

_From: Beelzebub, Prince of Hell_

_To: Lucifer, Father of Lies, King of the Bottomless Pit, etc. _

_Re: Hastur, Duke of Hell_

_It has come to our attention by a communication from the Demon Crowley, formerly of Hell, that Duke Hastur has purposely allowed a damned soul to escape the torments of Hell. Not only has he allowed this to happen, but he did aid and abet the escape of said damned human soul for his own cowardly benefit. We have investigated the matter and found the allegations to be true._

_As punishment we recommend Duke Hastur suffer the torments of the Ninth Circle, and in the constant company of the damned soul of Lydia Blackthorne, for a minimum of one decade. This punishment will be without the possibility of parole._

_From: Lucifer, Father of Lies, King of the Bottomless Pit, etc. _

_To: Beelzebub, Prince of Hell_

_Re: Proposed Punishment of Hastur, Duke of Hell_

_Status_: **APPROVED**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for being patient with the updates! I hope you find this last chapter to be a satisfying conclusion, as our boys start a new chapter in their lives.
> 
> **edited with just a mention as to how Adam is doing!**


End file.
